- Hi.
For the first aural test in grade three,
you're going to be asked to do a test
that is very similar to the first test
that's there in grades one and two.
Which means that if you want to look back
over the first test in grades one and two,
that would give you a bit of background practise
before you're ready to tackle the test for grade three.
What you've got to do for grade three
is outlined here on the board.
So the examiner's going to play a piece of music
and you're going to be asked to clap the pulse
of that piece of music.
So it's quite a good idea just to listen
to the first few beats of the piece
and just see if you can feel that pulse.
You know, it may be going quite quickly,
may be going quite slowly,
so you've just got to sort of feel
what the speed of the pulse is,
and as soon as you can feel that pulse,
then start to clap it.
And then you'll engage with that pulse,
and that's the first part of the test kind of taken care of,
which is good.
Now, the second part of it is this,
that once you get going with that clapping,
see if you can find the strong beats.
What do we mean by that?
Well, the strong beats are usually the first beats
of the bar, so you're particularly listening out
for the first beats of the bar.
So if, for example, the piece of music is in two time,
you're going to feel
strong, weak,
strong, weak.
And as you're feeling that,
it kind of tells you the answer to the next question,
because at the end of it,
when the examiner stops playing the piece of music,
the examiner will ask you,
"Is it in two, three, or four time?"
By which we mean are there two beats in each bar,
three beats in each bar,
or four beats in each bar?
So obviously, if you've been clapping
strong, weak,
there must be two beats in a bar.
One, two,
one, two.
Because when we're playing a piece of music,
we tend to put a little bit of stress
onto the first beat of the bar.
Now in the exam,
you might find that those first beats
are a little bit more stressed
than you might actually naturally do
when you're playing a piece,
just to help you to feel those strong beats.
But try and latch onto that and think,
"Oh yes, that felt a bit stronger than the next beat."
So I've got
strong, weak,
one, two,
one, two.
Now obviously, if you hear this,
strong, weak, weak,
that's telling you that there are three beats in a bar.
Because when you have a piece of music
with three beats in a bar,
the first beat's strong and the second
and the third beats are lighter.
So strong, weak, weak,
strong, weak, weak
is telling you
one, two, three,
one, two, three.
Now, when it comes to four time,
well, you're going to hear an emphasis
on the first beat in just the usual way.
Sometimes when we play pieces of music in four time
we put the biggest stress on beat number one,
we have a kind of light beat number two,
we put a kind of half a stress on beat number three,
and then we have a light beat number four.
So it's quite easy to confuse four with two because of that.
But in the exam, it'll be made clear
that there is a difference between two and four,
because when you're listening to a piece of music
in four time you'll hear that strong beat on number one
and then beats two, three, and four will be light.
So if you hear this,
strong, weak, weak, weak,
you know you're listening to
one, two, three, four,
one, two, three, four.
Now, the biggest sort of danger here
in grade three is that the first time
we're going to be asked about four time.
When you were doing grades one and two,
you only had to deal with two or three time.
But now we've got to deal with four time as well.
three time is usually a bit more obvious,
but make sure you don't confuse two time with four time.
So if it's two, it's going
strong, weak,
strong, weak.
And if it's four, it's going
strong, weak, weak, weak,
strong, weak, weak, weak.
So that's how you're going to be sure
that you're either dealing with two or four.
But you could have a piece of music that's in four time
and you could very happily be counting two,
because it will fit quite happily.
If you're counting two when it's in three time
it actually won't work very well.
Or if you're counting four when it's in three time
you'll soon realise that something's
not really working very well.
But when you're counting a piece of four time,
if you make the mistake of counting
one, two,
when actually it's going
one, two, three, four,
you can see how two and four might be just a bit confused.
So the clue here is to get going with the pulse,
but then really listen for the strong beats.
And decide, really,
whether you're hearing
strong, weak,
which is two.
Or you're hearing
strong, weak, weak,
in which case it's three.
Or if you're hearing
strong, weak, weak, weak,
in which case it's four time.
Okay, well, that's enough explanation.
What we really need to do now
is to get some practise at doing this.
So first of all,
I'm just going to play a few short pieces of music
and all I want you to do is to clap the pulse.
Don't worry about the second and third things.
Just see if you can clap the pulse of the music.
So here comes the first one.
Did you get the pulse of that?
(clapping pulse)
It's just to get you used to the fact
that you've got to work out the speed of the pulse,
because some pieces might be quick, some might be slow.
Okay, let's just try another one,
just getting used to finding that pulse.
Here comes the second excerpt.
So did you hear that was going quite quickly, actually,
wasn't it?
You were having this.
(clapping pulse)
Just so we get used to the fact
that it may be a reasonably fast speed.
Okay, see if you can find the pulse in this example.
Now that was a slower pulse, wasn't it?
It was doing this.
(clapping pulse)
So hopefully this gives you a little bit of practise
in adjusting the speed of your pulse to the piece of music.
Okay, now let's go on and see if we can do
what we've just done.
We're going to clap the pulse
and this time we're going to try
and feel those strong beats
and see if we can give a louder clap on the strong beats.
Now, as I think I've mentioned in the earlier grades,
when it comes to the strong beats,
you don't want to start with your hands wide apart
and try and clap a great, big, strong beat.
Because the first thing that might happen is
you might miss the other hand,
and you might actually find your hands sting a bit
after a while,
so you don't have to do a sort of massive thing
to get the strong beats.
Just make sure you're clapping a bit louder.
And really, if you use one hand to clap
into the palm of the other hand,
that's quite the safe way of doing it.
Because only one hand is moving
and the other hand sits still.
So you have a better chance
of actually hitting that hand on the beat.
So that may be something that you want to do.
So all we're going to do,
say it's in three time
and we're going to put a stronger clap on the first beat,
it's going to be something like this.
One, two, three,
one, two, three.
Can you hear, I'm just giving a louder clap
and then two lighter taps, really.
And then that makes it really clear
that you've heard the nice, clear pulse,
and you've also heard where the strong beat comes.
So see if you can do that as we go
through the following little exercises.
And as you get hold of that strong beat,
start to calculate,
"Am I clapping two or three or four?"
And let the strong beat be your guide,
because the strong beat is going to be number one.
Okay?
Here we go then.
Now, how did you get on with that?
Here's the pulse.
(clapping pulse)
And did you start to feel there,
strong, weak,
strong, weak.
So when you're asked this question you will be able
to say with confidence that that was in two time.
Okay, let's try another one and see how we get on this time.
Okay, this is the speed of that.
(clapping pulse)
So hopefully you got a pulse that did that.
Did you start to feel strong beats?
Strong, weak, weak,
strong, weak, weak,
one, two, three,
one, two, three.
So then you've got the answer to the last question
because you've felt where the strong beats come.
Okay, let's try another example.
See how you get on with this one.
Okay, did you get this for a pulse?
(clapping pulse)
Did you start to feel the strong beats?
Strong, weak, weak, weak,
strong, weak, weak, weak,
one, two, three, four,
one, two, three, four.
So obviously that piece of music was in four time.
Okay, now that should hopefully have helped you get the idea
of how to do this first test in grade two.
The only thing we haven't done so far
is that it's possible that you can have pieces
of music played that are in 6/8 time
or in 9/8 time.
And if you've done a bit of theory,
you'll know that 6/8 is what we call
a compound duple time.
Duple means it's got two beats in it.
You'll know that 9/8 is what we call
a compound triple time.
And if it's triple it means it's got three beats.
It doesn't really matter,
you're certainly not going to be expected to say
that it was in 6/8, or in 9/8,
or in another other time signature.
It's still all about feeling the beats.
The only thing to say about compound time,
like 6/8 and 9/8,
is that the beats sort of divide into threes.
You get one, two, three, four, five, six,
one, two, three, four, five, six
if you're in 6/8.
So you can hear that there's
one, two, three, four, five, six,
but there are not six beats, are there?
There are still two beats.
Because those six quavers in a 6/8 bar
get organised into two lots of three
and we have a beat at the start of each group of three.
So you get
one, two, three, four, five, six,
one, two,
one, two.
So here's a piece of music in 6/8,
just to give you the feel of that.
Okay?
So have a little listen to how this goes.
One, two,
one, two,
one, two.
So you can hear it's going one, two, three, four, five, six,
one, two, three, four, five, six,
but you're hearing that beat, which is going
one, two,
one, two.
And the same will be true for 9/8.
You might hear those nine quavers whizzing by,
but you're going to hear three beats.
So something like this.
One, two, three,
one, two, three,
one, two, three.
Now if you listen to all of the individual quavers,
you would hear
one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine,
but you're hearing three beats.
one, two, three,
one, two, three.
So there's no need to be put off by compound time,
and there's no need even, really,
to think too much about it,
but I just wanted to give you some practise there
in thinking what happens if you did have 6/8
or 9/8 as a time signature.
But the question remains the same.
Is it in two, three, or four time?
And I just mention those compound times
because what you don't want to do in the exam
is to be clapping furiously in 6/8
by going one, two, three, four, five, six,
one, two, three, four, five, six and then at the end of it
when you're asked if it's in two, three,
or four time be a bit confused.
Because you've already worked out
that maybe it's in six-time.
Well, it's not going to be in six time,
so if you did somehow make that mistake
in the test and you clapped six in every bar,
it's actually telling you it's in two time.
Because it's going
one, two, three, four, five, six,
one, two, three, four, five, six.
And if you managed to count nine in every bar
that's telling you it's in three time.
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine,
one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine.
And so on.
So I hope that gives you some useful practise
in dealing with the first test for grade three.
And when you're ready,
go on and have a look at the next film,
which is going to be about the second test for grade three.