Recording and Submitting Your Performance

Two kinds of rule

Coursework rules arrive as one long list, and students revise them as one long list. They are not one kind of thing. Some are gates. Break one and there is nothing to mark, however well you played. Others are costs. Go past one and you pay for it in the marking, but your work is still marked. Telling them apart is the whole of this module, because it decides what is worth worrying about.

Four words, four gates

The recording requirement is short: the performance must be live, unedited and uninterrupted, and your teacher must be present. Every one of those four is a gate. None of them is about how well you play, which is exactly why they are so easy to lose a whole component to.

What each requirement rules out

The joined takes

A student records their solo twice. The first take is better apart from one bar, so they take that bar from the second recording and drop it in. Nobody could hear the join. Can they submit it?

• Yes, because the playing in both takes was genuinely theirs
• Yes, as long as they say what they did
• No, because the recording has to be live and unedited, and this breaks both
• No, because the second take was worse overall

Sorted into the two kinds

Here is the Performing component split the way it actually behaves. The left column can leave you with nothing to mark. The right column changes what you earn.

What happens, in order

Put the four stages in the order they actually have to happen.

• Check the two pieces are different and each one reaches a minute
• Record each performance live, in one continuous run, with your teacher there
• Leave both recordings exactly as they came out
• The centre sends the files through the Learner Work Transfer platform

Which leave nothing to mark?

Which two of these are gates rather than costs?

• Patching a bar of the solo from a second take
• Recording the solo at home with nobody else there
• Running a little past the six minute combined guidance
• Choosing a piece that is comfortably within your reach
• Being nervous and taking the piece slightly under tempo

The maximum is guidance

The minimums are firm: each performance has to reach one minute, and the two together have to reach four minutes. The maximum behaves differently. Six minutes combined is guidance, not a rule. Going past it is self-penalising through the mark scheme rather than disqualifying, so an over-long submission is still marked. That is worth knowing in both directions: it is not a disaster, and it is not free either.

How short can the ensemble be?

A student has recorded a solo that runs to 90 seconds. The two performances together have to reach at least four minutes. What is the shortest their ensemble performance can be, in seconds?

One submission, checked through

A student submits a solo running to one minute forty, and an ensemble running to two minutes fifty. Both were played straight through in the music room with their teacher there, and neither file was touched afterwards. Different pieces: yes. Each over a minute: yes. Combined: four minutes thirty, over the minimum and under the guidance. Live, unedited, uninterrupted, teacher present: all four. Every gate clear, no cost incurred. Notice that the check took about twenty seconds and had nothing to do with how well either piece went.

Spot the two that fail

Here is a description of one submission. Exactly two details break a gate. Tap them.

• Both pieces run to about two minutes each
• The solo was recorded at home with nobody else there
• The ensemble was played straight through without stopping
• One wrong note in the solo was replaced from a second take
• The two pieces are different from each other
• The two together come to just over four minutes

The rules in a paragraph

A performance has to be recorded _____, in one _____ run, with a teacher _____. Nothing may be _____ once the recording has stopped. The finished files are submitted through the _____ platform.

Is it ready?

A verdict is only useful when it names what it rests on. Choose the option in each gap.

Three questions before the deadline

Someone in your class is getting their two performances ready and keeps asking you things. Work through them.

• They recorded the solo but stopped halfway, took a breath and started that section again. They ask whether it is usable.
• They re-record it cleanly. The solo runs to fifty seconds. Their ensemble runs to three and a half minutes.
• Both now clear the minimums, and together they run to six and a half minutes. They want to know whether to cut something.

Write what you would tell them

A friend has recorded their solo at home, on their own, and replaced one bar with a bar from a second take. It sounds excellent and they are proud of it. Write what you would tell them.

• Give the verdict first, before any explanation
• Name the requirements it breaks, and say why those are gates rather than costs
• Say what they would have to do instead
• Do not spend any of your answer on how well they played