Play that Funky Music

Just finished this morning's music theory and listening exams. The listening one was a pleasant surprise: 25 one-minute excerpts played once. I had to write down the composer, piece, and in certain cases, the movement. Happily, they pretty much chose the recognizable segments. They were a teensy bit evil in one respect; there were 5 "mystery pieces" liberally sprinkled throughout. For these, we needed to write the period (Classical, Baroque, Romantic, etc.) Trouble is, they didn't identify which ones would be the mystery pieces in advance. This meant that if you had skipped studying a piece such as Frescobaldi's "Toccata Prima" under the assumption that there would be only one solo harpsichord piece and you really needed the time to study the differences between Tchaikovsky and Berlioz--guess what?! The lovely appearance of another harpsichord piece could throw you off your game. Fortunately, I had heard the Frescobaldi enough to know that the one excerpt sounded familiar while the other one didn't. Thank heavens I hadn't heard the other in a previous life.

So all in all, I think the listening exam went okay. 17 out of 25 correct is a pass, and they do give partial credit, so hopefully my foibles won't torpedo my chances. I've had musical snippets running around my mind like squirrels in a forest for the past several weeks, which for me means that my brain was absorbing things along the way. Fingers crossed on this one!

The theory exam, on the other hand...I'd thought that the aural component would be my most challenging bit since I haven't done much with ear training. In this section, there were three questions. First, they played a horn excerpt of 8 measures, to be notated in concert pitch. We had to divine the starting note based on the key signature - i.e., they didn't say "This starts on Ab." And then we needed to transcribe the 8 measures. To be nice, they play the excerpt 5 times with some space in between, giving you a total of 15 minutes to figure it out. I have a bit of an audiographic memory, which helps me compare intervals and play various bits back in my mind. It's not fully audiographic, though, which means I definitely had some gaps.

Second question? Take the orchestral excerpt and notate the downbeat of each measure, which is played in the cello. Do a Roman numeral analysis underneath. Thank heavens it was tonal! There were still a few weird little chords which I couldn't entirely figure out Roman-numeral-wise, but I think I got the cello part notated correctly at least.

The third question was the most difficult. Also played 5 times, it was a two voice (2 instruments - one in the top staff, one in the bottom) melody over 8 measures. We were supposed to notate both voices, again discerning the starting pitch solely by the key signature. I tend to get a little lost in these since you need to listen not only for the notes/intervals and rhythms of each voice but also for the interplay. Hearing when one is resting while the other is moving along at its nice clip is the only way to get this sucker down on paper in the 15 minute time frame. Not exactly my strong suit.

The verdict on that part? Better than I thought, which is not to say much. The written part - figured bass realization, counterpoint completion, and harmonic analysis of a score excerpt...well, based on the marked contrast between my view - "This is crazy hard!" - and the proctor's view - "I looked at these questions, and they're very straightforward and easy!" - I think it may be a smart idea for me to end up in remedial theory anyway. This is one of the only tests - perhaps the only test - I've ever left early. 5 minutes before the close point, I figured my time would be better served reviewing my notes for the listening exam since I clearly wasn't making much more progress on this one.

I should know the final results tomorrow. In the meantime, it's off to grad student advising while trying to rid my brain of all the little StravinskyMozartBeethovenBachDebussyHaydn snippets.