It’s Exam Season!

If you are between 11 and 25 years old, you may well be involved in public exams of one sort or another.

SATs, 11-Plus, Common Entrance, GCSEs, A-Levels, T-Levels, University Exams, Entrance Exams, UKCAT, Finals, Dissertations, Post-Graduate Qualifications…

Perhaps you’re lucky, and they’re all over now.

Perhaps you’re waiting nervously for them to start.

Or you’re in the thick of it.

So I say, here and now, Good Luck To Everyone!

Then there’s waiting for the results, which is almost as bad as the lead-up to the exams. Or is it worse?

And spare a thought for your teachers! They are also biting their nails, hoping their students have done well, praying for favourable questions, offering last-minute revision tutorials…

So – what about music exams?

Nowadays, these can take place anywhere and at any time. There’s no “exam season”.

During Covid, all the music exam boards scrambled to make changes which didn’t involve people being too close together or in each other’s houses. Now, suddenly, you could submit a video recording made in your own home, instead of meeting an examiner in a public venue. Now, for the first time, you could play your violin or trombone pieces with a recorded accompaniment, so that you didn’t have to invite an accompanist to your house (illegal at the time). Now, also for the first time, examiners marked music exams in their own homes, watching the recordings at their own pace, whenever they felt like it.

At first it was, to say the least, chaotic. Eventually, it settled down. It’s been going long enough now to feel “normal”. All my students now take these so-called “digital exams”. Mostly, we record during your lesson in my house. If I teach you remotely, you record whenever you like in your house. Then you send me the recording and I submit it to the board.

Which board?

Trinity College, London.

Why?

Because, many years ago, I was employed by Norfolk Music Service, part of Norfolk County Council. They sent me to various schools in Norfolk to teach music. In a number of primary schools, I was asked to teach electronic keyboard, a new experience for me. I enjoyed it. The children enjoyed it. They made good progress. I looked into the possibility of grade exams, and found that ABRSM, which I’d used exclusively until then, didn’t offer any exams for that instrument.

But Trinity did. For a year or two my keyboardists worked for TCL exams and my pianists for ABRSM. But – different aural tests. Different marking system. Different exam venues. Different exam dates, too. Different entry protocols. So I transitioned everyone over to TCL. Much easier!

For many years I ran my own Trinity exam centre in my home. Three times a year we held exams here, and other teachers entered through me. One session, we had three whole days of exams, morning till evening. The examiner stayed in some hotel, but I provided drinks and a mid-day meal when he was here. The sessions always went well, and I had help with the running of the day from a colleague.

Well, that all stopped in March 2020 of course.

Around the same time, TCL made changes to the style of their certificates. This is nothing new; all exam boards do this from time to time. But this particular change was significant. It wasn’t just a different colour in the decorative border, or a move to thinner, cheaper paper, or the introduction of a charge to obtain a certificate in physical form – all of which have, in fact, happened… No, this was different. This was the decision (made by whom, I wonder?) no longer to include the name of the teacher or the school who had entered the candidate for the exam.

Certificates always used to have the candidate’s name in big, bold letters, and underneath that would be the words: “Presented for examination by [name of teacher or school]”. Teachers and their pupils valued this acknowledgement of the teamwork needed to achieve a high standard of playing.

My colleagues and I were incensed at this decision, and my response was to have an ink-stamp made, saying the same thing, with which I now stamp all certificates issued by TCL. For theory exams I still use ABRSM, and they have not taken this step. Thank goodness.

And now Trinity have made another change, this time to their mark sheets, or exam reports. These used to be a single sheet of A4 with the examiner’s comments typed in black text on a white background. It was easy to read. You could store it digitally and/or print it, using one sheet of paper. Again, easy to do. But no longer.

This year, the TCL exam reports cover three pages, including large bands of their signature purple colour. Of course, digital storage is still fine. And if you want to print your report you can do so in black-and-white rather than use gallons of coloured ink. But you’ll still use a lot of black ink when all that purple turns to grey –and you’ll still need three sheets of paper.

Not only that! In face-to-face exams you’re told the name of the examiner. In the original digital exams, the “Examiner Number” was printed at the bottom of the report. Now, the examiner is faceless, nameless and numberless. A recent report I received was so strangely expressed I was convinced that an AI had been used.

I wrote to Trinity about their new-style reports. I asked if any teachers or pupils had been consulted on this change. I asked to be told the size of their focus groups. I asked who, precisely, had actually requested new exam reports in this bulky, expensive format. I got the usual type of answer: bland, uninformative, assuring me that my concerns are of great importance – blah, blah, blah.

I reproduce the reply in full below:

Hi Rory,

Thank you for your email and for your continued support of Trinity College London practical music exams and Digital Grades over the years.

I have received an update from the relevant team regarding the recent change to the report format.

The report format for UK Digital Grades was recently updated to align with the standard format used for all MyTrinity results reports. The new format has been designed to be more user-friendly for candidates accessing their results digitally through MyTrinity, while still allowing reports to be downloaded and printed if required.

Additionally, Trinity is planning to move UK Digital Grades candidates across to MyTrinity by September, after which candidates will also begin receiving their results online through the platform.

At present, the previous single-page black-and-white report format is no longer available, and reports will continue to be issued in the new format going forward.

Thank you once again for taking the time to contact us and share your thoughts regarding the reports.

Kind Regards,

As you see, none of my questions was answered. As a result, I’m considering moving (back) to ABRSM for piano exams. Keyboardists will still use Trinity. And if you’ve started a Trinity piano exam, you’ll continue with that (unless you prefer to swap, of course).

However, there’s an issue, and I’d welcome your thoughts on this: ABRSM digital exams are different from Trinity’s. With ABRSM, you can take face-to-face exams in the usual format (three pieces, scales, aural and sight-reading tests), but if you opt for their digital exams (video recordings), you play four pieces. That’s it. No exercises and no scales! I know how upsetting this is, because we all love our scales.

This wouldn’t necessarily mean the end of scales! Just as I continue to get my pupils to improve their sight-reading (using books called “Improve your Sight-Reading”), I would also continue to make you play scales. So that’s a relief.

But, seriously, what do you think? Should we move to ABRSM for piano grades? Or shall we put up with TCL and their high-handed changes nobody asked for or wants? And, seriously, how do you feel about the scales and about performing four pieces? I’m assured by ABRSM, because I sent them some queries, that their “Performance Grades” have the same status/value/points as their “normal” exams. So you don’t lose out in any way, they tell me. But you may feel differently.

I’d like to hear from all of you, and will make my decision based on your responses. So please don’t be shy in letting me know your opinion of all this. This goes for parents of pupils too, of course. If you’re a keyboard player, or you don’t take piano grade exams, this discussion won’t affect you, but I’m interested in your views too, of course.

Every Humoresque finishes with an invitation to respond to the points made or the discussion raised, but in this one I really want to hear from everybody. Even if you are a subscriber who is not a pupil of mine! Please get back to me with your thoughts in the next couple of weeks, if you would be so kind.

Unlike TCL, I will make my decision based on the views of people who actually take, or have taken, or are the parents of children who are taking, music exams! So I await your responses with anticipation and excitement!

I’d love to know what you think of this Humoresque. You can put a comment in the box below this post, or you can email me directly. I read and respond to everything.

Humoresque is available to anyone who might be interested. You don’t have to be one of my pupils, or even learning music. If you know anyone who might be interested in subscribing to Humoresque, please let me know. I will only need their name and their email address. Thanks.

Humoresque = a whimsical or fanciful piece of music. Be whimsical, be fanciful, but play in time!

This is Humoresque Number 39