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Picking music practical pieces.

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  • 25-09-2014 8:47pm
    #1
    burrenguy
    Registered Users Posts: 416 ✭✭


    Our teacher hasn't told us much about this. What's the story with this? I play banjo and sing/play guitar... Do I need four pieces for each? Is it advisable to spread out the genres of the songs?
    At the moment I'm thinking of:
    1) Give me Love - Ed Sheeran
    2) Ordinary Man - Christy Moore
    3) Tears in Heaven - Eric Clapton
    nothing picked for the fourth yet.
    Thanks everyone.


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    #2
    spurious
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Education Moderators Posts: 27,139 CMod ✭✭✭✭spurious


    Looking at those, I'd pick something along the trad spectrum if you can for another piece, just for variety.


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    #3
    Acciaccatura
    Registered Users Posts: 428 ✭✭Acciaccatura


    The way practicals work is that you either do six pieces on one activity or four pieces + four pieces on two activities. If you want to play both banjo and guitar, that's 2 activities, so, 4+4. For the guitar/singing, you can choose whether you want to be examined on just singing, just playing (try to only pick this if you're playing a melody and not chords), or both. Spurious is right with the trad thing, they like variety, so you might prefer to incorporate that with the banjo, but for a 4th guitar song, try to go for a different genre, like jazz, blues, or alter a well known pop song to a guitar rendition.

    If it's any help, the way I worked my practical was 4 trad pieces on a traditional flute (they pretty much had to be trad, so I went for a jig, a hornpipe, a slip jig and a fusion piece that had a reel bit in it) and 4 piano pieces (ragtime, New Age (I think was its genre?), a Strauss waltz (I think that's the Romantic era? It was the Blue Danube, anyway) and early 20th century (an odd piece by Bartok))

    Good luck! :)


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    #4
    Conor_B
    Registered Users Posts: 26 ✭Conor_B


    Do the music tech option if it's still around. It's basically free marks.


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    #5
    Troxck
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,386 ✭✭✭Troxck


    Conor_B wrote: »
    Do the music tech option if it's still around. It's basically free marks.

    Music Technology is still around but they have changed how it is marked to stop the idea that it is "free marks", but yes, it is very easy to pick up close to 100% in it with continuous practice.

    I'll be doing Music Tech along with 4 pieces on Trumpet. Two will be classical repertoire to show I can play and follow strict notations etc. etc. and my other two will be modern pop, just for variation. I assume you have at least one practical class a week (my class is tiny so we have two!) Every practical class try and play a different style and ask your teacher what they think of that and whether it is exam standard.

    Make sure to practice in front of different people to make sure nerves don't play a factor on the day!


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