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AQA A2 Music Essays

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Reply 80

jellybean_e

I thought listening was pretty tough..essays were okay though - hopefully done enough to get my A overall!!

Reply 81

wind-swept

HeadlessJedi

Oh get out, please :wink:

Grrrrr Imperial for specifying an A in music :s-smilie:

ouch.....

Reply 82

Gurnani P

Found it alright, listening was quite tricky, none of the singing ones were easy to pick out single notes. Essays were not bad, did the VW one about thematic material, and the Chamber Music one about Debussy.

Reply 83

callumsbk

Gurnani P

did the VW one about thematic material, and the Chamber Music one about Debussy.

Hahaha that's exactly what I did. Found the listening okay except for the opera question and the final question. Couldn't pick out how the melody had changed. I ended up writing a mountain of rubbish for the Debussy answer, I couldn't remember any quotes :s-smilie:

Went better than I thought, the VQ question was a peach.

Reply 84

MusicalAlchemy

callumsbk

found the listening okay except for... the final question. Couldn't pick out how the melody had changed.

Yeah - same here :s-smilie:

I couldn't remember what it sounded like the first time around to be able to comment on it. Bleh. Surprised they actually asked us to name cadences - usually they don't bother with simple stuff like that on A2s...but hey. The rest of the listening was fairly standard, though i thought it odd they didn't finish with the scored quetsion like they usually do...

I loved the chamber music question - i did the first one - Brahms <3. Our set work was the Mahler - and i swear there always seems to be a question about how he's innovative? All my class were really o_O about it coming up, but XD at the same time, haha. Fingers crossed and we'll find out in the summer how it went!!

Reply 85

Felicity-Quackers

MusicalAlchemy

I loved the chamber music question - i did the first one - Brahms <3. Our set work was the Mahler - and i swear there always seems to be a question about how he's innovative? All my class were really o_O about it coming up, but XD at the same time, haha. Fingers crossed and we'll find out in the summer how it went!!

I did the same questions and wrote about Brahms! I only really knew one piece though- the Clarinet Quintet. Did you compare??
The second Mahler question about traditional structures? Thought it was pretty good question ran out of time so only bullet pointed the last movement.
Also my listening skills seemed to disappear in that exam. Just telling myself it's only worth 8% of our A level!

Reply 86

olipal

Thought it was very OK. Could have been a lot worse, and I'm glad the last two questions weren't horrendously specific. I do think I waffled on a bit though.

Reply 87

HeadlessJedi

If I got more than half marks on the listening I would be impressed... and ecstatic.

The VW essay about themes was OK (practically a commentary on the exposition and recap of the movement...right?)

I did the jazz essay on composers-I ended up writing about the characteristics of their most famous pieces (I chose Duke Ellington and Dizzy Gillespie as my composers), and how these characteristics showed their inventiveness etc etc.

OH GOD PANIC :woo:

Reply 88

musicmad123

HeadlessJedi

I did exactly the same as you, probably get less than half on the listening !!

Yeah I found the VW ok but I don't think I was specific enough
Yeahh I definately rambled too much I did Glenn Miller annd Louis Armstrong yeah I;m not sure about that one!

But at the end of the day, I'm still happy now cause that was my last exam :smile:

There's nothing you can do now so no point worrying :biggrin:

Reply 89

MusicalAlchemy

Felicity-Quackers

I compared his Quintet/quartet (can never remember) in F with his piano trio in B because i know the 4th movement really well (can hear it in my head dum...dum de dum dum...dum dum...etc so yeah). But i made something up about the piano and just blithered on a lot :biggrin:

The traditional structures i liked - because we've focussed a lot on how Mahler is untraditional. Also - a famous quote of his to Sibelius in 1906/7 was "The symphony must be the world in that it is all encompassing" and that...just...made up my whole essay basically!

Mneh. Not too sure how they mark the essays tbh :s-smilie:

Listening really depends on what comes up tbh!

Reply 90

HeadlessJedi

What are the grade boundaries generally for A2 music exams? Any ideas?

Reply 91

jellybean_e

is it not just 80% for an A?! i thought that was standard :s-smilie:

Reply 92

musicmad123

last year I got about 55% for the exam section and got a B for that part of it, although that was AS, are the boundaries higher for A2 ? I don't really know how it works

Reply 93

callumsbk

The music boundaries are normally low, which is probably why you got 55% and got a B, making 60% an A. The AS exam was a lot harder than today's exam (in context of course), so I reckon that it'll be 70% A, 60% B etc this time around. Saying that, I don't really know. Hopefully they stay low and we all get 30% A*s :smile:

Reply 94

Felicity-Quackers

MusicalAlchemy

The traditional structures i liked - because we've focussed a lot on how Mahler is untraditional. Also - a famous quote of his to Sibelius in 1906/7 was "The symphony must be the world in that it is all encompassing" and that...just...made up my whole essay basically!
QUOTE]

Yeah, I think we did a practice essay based on that quote :smile:

I'm hoping I can get away with the non-comparing thing, I did reference the clarinet trio he composed with it but that was like one sentence because I really know nothing about it. Should be alright though cos I got an A last year and I only need a B for uni :smile:

Reply 95

Ollie53

tommm

I'm not OK with either :] so don't worry haha

Hey Tom - how did it go!?

Reply 96

qgujxj39

Ollie53

Hey Tom - how did it go!?

Averagely. Much easier than I expected, which means it was pretty hard.

You?

Reply 97

Ollie53

tommm

Averagely. Much easier than I expected, which means it was pretty hard.

You?

Wasn't brilliant, but then again, it wasn't awful. I came out of the exam thinking I had done ok, but then upon reflection realised there were a lot of things that I missed out in the essays/got wrong in the listening. I hope it's enough for an A (although, I was really going for the A* :lolwut:

). I'm sure you don't need music for maths though? So you'll be fine :biggrin:

Reply 98

Ed434

I didn't do too badly on the listening, I don't think. Did anybody else thank Peep Show for the help on the question with the vocals? Mark sings that song, admittedly quite badly, on an episode, so I could narrow it down before I'd even heard it. Essays, I did the VW one about Movement one, although the word 'organise' in the question threw me a bit. I did the Choral question on how they made it exciting by how they set the words...I think I may have got a B; we shall see....