Understanding Specialist Study at Leeds College of Music

Specialist Study:

You’ll notice that in our undergraduate courses excluding Music Production and Music Business, there is a Specialist Study strand where you will be asked to specify your main instrument or state composition as your main focus. This strand is a vital part in your course as you are given an hour of one-to-one tuition per week depending on which instrument you choose. You also will have ensemble group study and other supporting classes which I will go into more detail later.

One-to-One Tuition
When filling in your application you will have to choose your Specialist instrument based on where you feel your strongest skills lie. This doesn't mean you can’t play other instruments, but in your recitals, your mark will be based on your chosen instrument.

A typical one-to-one session would involve bringing a piece of music to work on with your tutor. Here you can go over any problems you are experiencing or just get some advice on how you are doing. If you choose composition as your specialist study, then you would similarly bring some of your own material in and work on that. These sessions are relatively laid back in terms of you choosing what to work on, and it’s a great way to get some honest advice and asking any questions that you may not be able to ask in other lectures.

Ensemble Group Study
Ensemble group study is an hour and a half session spent working with your peers. You get to experience working in bands and rotate with different students each week for the first semester. You’re given songs to rehearse and perform in a short period of time and then in the future, you are then placed into a more permanent band where you have the chance to write your own material. A lot of students get a great experience out of these sessions, especially if they want to/ already have a function band and gig regularly.

Weekly Workshops
In addition to these sessions, you will also have a supporting workshop. For example, if your main instrument is vocals, you would have a seminar with your other peers who have chosen vocals too. Each one differs slightly, but they all involve working together in some way including giving each other feedback on their performance and song writing in groups if you've chosen composition.

(edited 9 years ago)

Reply 1

Jack_Sax

Can you be explicit about the number of one-one lessons I will get and over how many weeks per the 3 years? Also how can classical musicians be given songs to rehearse? Sorry but this is to help me understand it is doing the opposite.

Leeds Conservatoire

Leeds

Reply 2

Jack_Sax

Hey man, can I get a reply?

Reply 3

Leeds Conservatorie

Hi Jack,

Apologies for any confusion over the one to one lessons. They are weekly and you would have approximately 30 lessons per academic year.

With regards to the ensemble study, I will look at editing those details to make it more pathway focused. In the meantime, I would recommend getting in touch with our enquiries team who would be able to answer your questions in more detail. You can contact them on 0113 222 3416 or email us at [email protected].

I hope this helps and thank you very much for the feedback on this information. It is much appreciated!

Best wishes,
Jemma

Reply 4

Jack_Sax

Hey Jemma

Cheers for the reply. Yeah it would be good to edit this. We looked at it in my music class at school and all agreed that it doesnt tell us what we need to know. The bit about one-to-ones being laid back seems very strange :smile:

We thought all of this was written by someone who doesnt know much about music.

Anyway as it took a while to get a reply my teacher called a couple of the instrumental tutors at Leeds College of Music he knows to get some help. So with your reply Im even more confused. So it would be awesome if you could say if its right. They basically said that at Leeds College of Music the BA course is 3 years and you get 20 one hour one-to-ones per year. They also said that the academic year is 20 weeks with 10 weeks before xmas and 10 weeks after. So that is 20 hours of one-to-ones a year over 3 years???? I dont understand your approximately 30 (sprry) .I just want to know about one-to-ones instrumental. At the other conservatoires it is very clear they say either 30 hours of one-to-one instrumental over 4 years OR 40 hours of one-to-one instrumental over 4 years. Please can you help as I did call the enquiries people but again I didnt get specifics. I dont want to pay £27 000 and not know what it is exactly Im getting.

Also, is it right that Leeds College of Music is a FE College that has HE and is not independent? It would be good to see how Leeds College of Music is ranked against other HE in FE Colleges, the other conservatoires and uni music departments. Where can I or my tracher see this information?

Cheers for your help

Reply 5

Leeds Conservatorie

Hi Jack,

Thanks for your reply.

I wrote the information above based on how the Pop course was laid out, as this is the course I studied last year. I'll try to find if there are differences between the other courses and edit it.

By laid back, I mean the lessons are flexible so you choose what you focus on in that hour. The tutor will also guide you but you will have some freedom to decide what you work on.

If your teacher has spoken with one of our instrumental tutors, then they will know best how many weeks they teach so I would trust that it is 20 hours per academic year.

With regards to your other questions, the best advice I can give is to attend one of our open days. That way you can talk to the tutors on the course and they will be able to answer your questions better than anyone else.

Our next open day is on 26th September and you can book your place here:
http://www.lcm.ac.uk/courses/experience-days/UGbook

Hope this helps,

Jemma

(edited 8 years ago)