rockshool

Rockschool is fairly new on the Grading scene, but it gets a good review from Total Guitar Magazine, and the Musical Director at one of the orchestras I play for teaches it, and he reckons it's dificult.

The other Grading colleges - ABRSM, Trinity and LCM - have all agree dthe difficulty levels of their grade exams, so there should not be any difference between them. I don't know if Rockschool have been part of that discussion.

A :-)

Thanks Alan - i might just look into them then.
much appreciated.
oh - and its 4 1/2 weeks until half term!!!! i cant wait!

I happen to have copies of the Rockschool books (unstamped so they can be used in the exams) for grades 4 and 5 sitting around if you want them. They've updated since I got them, but I think the tunes are mostly the same. I'm heading into town now, so I'll swing by the music store and double check. Give me a few days to make copies of the material for personal use and I'll post them to you if they're of use.

I like the Rockschool syllabus - there's a range of styles you can chose from, but practicing all of the pieces will give you a strong grounding in many styles, and they also test your listening skills (e.g. play back short chord sequence or riff after hearing it), sight reading skills (again, just chords at lower levels, but it gets more complicated later on), ability to improvise/constuct a solo (most pieces have space for you to create a solo, and I think some grades have an improvisation component in the test, too), and knowledge of scales, arpeggios and your instrument.

I'm hoping to start lessons in jazz guitar with a guy now and haven't checked if he has these grades because he has a very good reputation in jazz so I know he will have the skills to develop my playing in that area, but if I was looking for a general teacher of electric guitar I'd want to know they either had a very strong rep or had grades. Same goes for classical or anything else. IIRC, there's also a grades syllabus for teachers, but you'd have to check the website for details on that as I've yet to investigate further myself. They also do grades and sample questions in sight reading, listening, and theory.

For teaching, I'd say the key thing is bieing honest and firm in your advertising - it's like this jazz guy I'm looking into. I've been working on jazz on my own because while many teachers say they can teach jazz I've found they often have about as much knowledge as me. I need someone who has more than my current skill set, and has more in a specific area. If you can e.g. play electric guitar really well and play a bit on acoustic, don't advertise for both*. Same goes for styles of music. Stick to teaching what you know well enough and you'll build a strong reputation. Trying to teach something you don't know well is an instant way to lose clients. But I'm stating the obvious here (just come across some pretty mediocre teachers in my time).

*For beginner's guitar, you'll probably be able to teach both. That was just an example.I'm hoping it was clear enough. :roll:

thanks scrybe - and thanks for the offer of the books - but ill feel too cheeky asking you to post them so ill decline on that.
what i will do however is ask this:

How does rockschool work? how do you take exams, who marks them, how do i subscribe, and is it compulsory to start right at grade 1 and pass them all, or is there some sort of assessment to let me know which grade to start at?

in other words - what do i need to do to be graded by rockschool?

When you get the book, there's an application form inside for registering to take the exam. They hold three "exam sessions" each year and will book you in at your nearest location, but you generally have to be free for a few days as you don't know in advance which specific day you'll be examined for. They are good at notifying you of this though (in my experience). Luckily, the exam periods tends to be geared to take place when the kids aren't in school so, with any luck, you shouldn't have work commitments. The exams are marked by a panel of ABRSM judges but I'm afraid I don't know much more about what someone has to do to become an examiner.

You don't have to start at Grade 1, but I'd recommend starting at the grade which best reflects your weakest area (e.g. I really don't like being tested on my ear, I get way too nervous and self-conscious, so I started with Grade 4 - the performance pieces were really too easy for me, but I learned about other styles and now have a handy backing disc, and it meant I wouldn't fail because of my weakest area). There's no test for working out which grade to start at besides entering for one of them and either passing with a distinction, barely scraping a pass, or failing! But the books give examples for each of the things you're expected to be able to do, so I'd suggest browsing in your local store to gauge which grade is the right one for you to start with. I'm a bit busy at the moment (and not entirely sure where exactly those books are), but I'll post tomorrow with outlines of the expectations between grades 4-6. Tbh, I've checked out grades 7 and 8 and the pieces aren't too demanding at all (i.e. there's a lot you could do beyond the grade 8 requirements), but creating your own tasty solos of a similar standard and passing all the other tests makes it a very rigorous form of assessment. I could nail the performances for grade 8 now, but I know I'd flunk out on things like sight reading, so I'm currently working up to that.

Hope this helps. Good luck with your plans!

Is rockshool really spelled that way?

:lol: no :D

but due my inability to check for typing errors - let from this day forth, rock school to be renamed to "rockshool" :lol:

I didn't even notice!

Will post about grade requirements tomorrow - I got sidetracked today and totally forgot about this, sorry!*

*FWIW, I was cooking up a nice slice of funkyness while being distracted, so it was for a good cause.... 8)