Watch the video explaining how to navigate the practice papers and questions and why this form of revision is important
general knowledge questions
comparison questions
extended writing questions
notation/dictation questions
These are usually multiple choice, tick-a-box, circle your answer, one word (e.g. give one feature/name an instrument/name a composer or artist etc) or multiple point answers (e.g. give three features/name two instruments/compare the tempo of both etc). General knowledge questions make up the bulk of the listening paper and can be considered the easiest type of question in the paper.
Each exam will contain only one extended writing question. This is a question usually worth 8-9 marks which is approximately 10% of the entire exam. Students are asked to write an extended paragraph - one A4 page - describing an extract of music.
Sometimes the question is linked to a theme and students must link their descriptive writing to that theme. For example 'this extract describes the movement of hens and chickens'. With this particular example students' responses must relate to how the music successfully represents the movement of the hens and chickens. This is the ONLY question in the listening exam where the quality of students' responses are also assessed.
Each exam will only contain one comparison question. The comparison question is typically worth anywhere between 12-16 marks.
This type of question involves students listening to two extracts and answering questions in which they are comparing the two extracts, both similarities and differences. Sometimes the comparison question will contain a short extended writing style question, like you will have read about above. However, the extended writing portion will never be as substantial as the actual extended writing question itself and will be worth considerably less marks.
Each exam will only contain one notation/dictation question. This type of question is worth 12-16 marks, occasionally more.
The notation/dictation question involves students studying a printed score (notated extract of music using traditional staff notation) and answering questions related to the score. This question involves students filling in missing notes in one or two bars of music, which itself is a sub-question worth 6 to 8 marks. The other sub-questions are general knowledge questions.
Both the exam practice questions AND the practice papers are from the four sources above; Rhinegold, CGP, OCR specimen, OCR
There are only a handful of complete papers but there are hundreds of exam questions. The labelling system can be very confusing. Please follow this guidance very carefully to avoid confusion when searching THROUGH THE EXAM PRACTICE QUESTIONS.
Questions are first labelled according to their source e.g. 'Rhinegold'
They are then labelled according to one of the four Areas of Study e.g. 'Conventions of Pop' (there are three more - Film Music, Rhythms of the World, The Concerto Through Time)
They are then labelled according to their category e.g. 'Comparison Question'
They are then labelled according to their (paper number for Rhinegold only then) question number e.g. 'P2 Q7' which stands for paper 2, question 7 (Rhinegold)
The mark sheet is labelled as 'ANSWERS' at the end
There are two file formats - pdf which is a document, and mp3 which is the audio file (music)
For example here is an actual practice question that you will come across that uses the file labelling system:
Rhinegold Practice Papers P3 Q6 Comparison Question.pdf Note that this is a pdf file
Rhinegold Practice Papers P3 Q6A Comparison Question.mp3 THIS IS EXTRACT A OF THE AUDIO FILE FOR THE SAME QUESTION
Rhinegold Practice Papers P3 Q6A Comparison Question.mp3 THIS IS EXTRACT B OF THE AUDIO FILE FOR THE SAME QUESTION
Rhinegold Practice Papers P3 Q6 Comparison Question ANSWERS.pdf THIS IS THE ANSWER SHEET
As you can see, it can be very confusing but if you can think of a better way to organise the hundreds of questions available then please do tell!