Music grades are useful.
There. That’s probably disappointed half the people who clicked on the title.
They’re also nowhere near as important as we sometimes pretend they are.
I’ve taught Grade 8 musicians who were absolutely superb. Confident, musical, technically accomplished players who thoroughly deserved the result they achieved.
I’ve also taught Grade 8 musicians who, outside the fairly narrow requirements of an exam, really weren’t very good players.
And that’s the problem with treating grades as a measurement of musicianship.
They measure something.
They don’t measure everything.
What Does Grade 8 Actually Mean?
At its simplest, a Grade 8 certificate tells us that somebody met the requirements of a particular Grade 8 exam on a particular day.
That’s an achievement. It may represent years of hard work, and it shouldn’t be dismissed.
But we sometimes allow the number on the certificate to acquire a much bigger meaning.
Grade 3 becomes “a Grade 3 player”.
Grade 5 becomes “a Grade 5 player”.
Grade 8 becomes “an advanced musician”.
Those things aren’t necessarily the same.
A pupil might prepare three pieces exceptionally well, learn the required technical work and become very good at the particular supporting tests required by their exam board.
But what happens when you put an unfamiliar piece of music in front of them?
Can they learn something without a teacher showing them how?
Can they play with other musicians?
Can they recover when something goes wrong?
Can they listen and respond to what somebody else is playing?
Can they improvise?
Can they play something simply because they heard it and thought, I want to learn that?
Can they make music?
A grade certificate can’t answer all of those questions.
Grades Can Be Brilliant
There are plenty of good reasons to take exams.
They provide structure. They give pupils a clear target. They can motivate someone who enjoys having something concrete to work towards.
They can introduce repertoire a pupil might otherwise never encounter.
Preparing for an exam can also teach some genuinely valuable skills: attention to detail, performing under pressure, working towards a deadline and getting a piece of music from “I can basically play it” to “this is properly prepared”.
That last distinction matters. It’s something I explore in Practice Till It’s Done, Not Till the Timer Goes Off: the goal of practising should be to achieve something specific, rather than simply accumulate minutes.
And passing an exam feels good.
It should.
A pupil has worked for something and achieved it.
The problem starts when passing the next grade becomes the entire purpose of learning an instrument.
The Grade Conveyor Belt
Grade 1.
Passed.
Right. Grade 2.
Passed.
Grade 3.
And so on.
There’s something wonderfully measurable about it. Parents understand it. Pupils understand it. Teachers understand it.
Everyone can see progress because the number keeps getting bigger.
It’s much the same problem I discussed in Stop Trying to Finish the Book. Moving through a syllabus can look like progress, but getting to the end doesn’t necessarily mean everything along the way has been properly learnt.
But musical progress isn’t always that tidy.
Sometimes the best thing for a pupil after Grade 4 isn’t Grade 5.
Perhaps they need six months of playing music they love.
Perhaps they need to improve their sight-reading.
Perhaps their technique has some holes in it.
Perhaps they need to play with other people.
Perhaps they need to learn how to work things out by ear.
Perhaps they simply need time to become a better musician before starting another exam.
None of those things produces a certificate.
They still count.
“What Grade Are You?”
It’s a surprisingly difficult question.
Because we’ve become accustomed to using grades as shorthand for ability.
Sometimes that’s useful. If somebody tells me they’ve recently passed Grade 5, I have some information about what they can probably do.
But I wouldn’t know how good a musician they are.
I’d need to hear them play.
And I’d want to know what else they can do.
There are excellent musicians who have never taken an exam.
There are excellent musicians who have taken every exam available to them.
Neither fact makes them excellent.
The playing does.
Exams Should Serve the Pupil
This is probably where I land on grades.
Not pro-grade.
Not anti-grade.
Pro-pupil.
If an exam gives a pupil motivation, direction and a worthwhile challenge, brilliant. Do it.
If preparing for the next exam means spending month after month grinding through material they don’t particularly enjoy purely because Grade 6 comes after Grade 5, perhaps don’t.
Not every pupil wants the same things from their lessons, either. As I explored in The Pupil Who Never Practises But Never Misses a Lesson, some pupils simply enjoy playing an instrument without having any particular ambition to become brilliant at it.
A syllabus is a useful tool.
It isn’t a curriculum handed down from the heavens.
We’re allowed to leave it occasionally.
The Bit of Paper Isn’t the Music
Passing Grade 8 is an achievement.
It isn’t the end of learning an instrument, and it certainly isn’t proof that there’s nothing left to learn.
In many ways, that’s where things get interesting.
There’s an enormous musical world outside the exam room: playing with other people, learning repertoire because you love it, improvising, composing, recording, performing, experimenting and developing your own musical identity.
Grades can be part of that journey.
For some pupils, they can be a very valuable part of it.
But they’re a route through music.
They’re not the destination.