Music Performance at TCD????

scottg4life

I'm a 5th Year student in Dublin and I am looking at all the colleges with Music course in them. I'm 16. I play the piano and I am currently on Grade 6 RIAM and I want to study music when I am older. I would like to be a Concert Pianist when I am older and I want to know what TCD has to offer in the music course. From your knowledge how would I become a Concert Pianist in years to come. Anyone a pianist or is studying music at TCD please tell me your experiences!

Anything you know about Music Performance at TCD please let me know! Thanks.

AndrewJD

I don't want to dash hopes and destroy dreams or anything, but from my time as a music teacher, anyone hoping to go towards a concert pianist career path would really be past the grade system at your point. A lot of people are really good at the piano - but at a professional level it isn't quite enough. It takes a tremendous amount of talent. It's about artistic interpretation and creativity which sits on top of mind-blowing skills. So the players you see go on to these levels tend to have flown through traditional piano tuition within a few years. Having a career as a pianist in other respects is perfectly within reason, but concert pianists are the few and the great.

Now it may well be that I'm wrong. I haven't heard you play. I don't know how long you've been playing. If you think you can do it, I say go for it. Don't let a cynical person like me ruin things. Take this as a warning of sorts.

Now hopefully someone else will come in with happy thoughts and useful course information

scottg4life

AndrewJD wrote: »

I don't want to dash hopes and destroy dreams or anything, but from my time as a music teacher, anyone hoping to go towards a concert pianist career path would really be past the grade system at your point. A lot of people are really good at the piano - but at a professional level it isn't quite enough. It takes a tremendous amount of talent. It's about artistic interpretation and creativity which sits on top of mind-blowing skills. So the players you see go on to these levels tend to have flown through traditional piano tuition within a few years. Having a career as a pianist in other respects is perfectly within reason, but concert pianists are the few and the great.

Now it may well be that I'm wrong. I haven't heard you play. I don't know how long you've been playing. If you think you can do it, I say go for it. Don't let a cynical person like me ruin things. Take this as a warning of sorts.

Now hopefully someone else will come in with happy thoughts and useful course information

I am on Grade 6 and I have been playing piano since I was 9 and I am good. I think I would be able to do it with practice.Besides I have years to become a concert pianist you don't have to start at a young age!

ilovemybrick

5th year, and you are Grade 6 RIAM, are you attending RIAM or sitting exams externally? I would be under the impression that someone actually studying in the Academy would be quite aware that this standard is not really on track to continue to 3rd level full time performance degrees, let alone holding professional performance aspirations.

While I appreciate your ambition, I am not convinced you actually understand that at 16 most of the virtuosi are well past gold medal status and simply waiting to turn 18 to be eligible for the diploma certification and as such being Grade 6 doesnt really demonstrate that you would be on track for this.

electrogrimey

I agree with the other posters, but thought I'd answer your question anyway.

There's no performance in the TCD music course, AFAIK, it's all academic, like most colleges in Ireland. My suggestion would be to do the Diploma in the RIAM, and after practicing VERY hard for the first few months of the course go for a performance course in London (or America or Britain) at the auditions around Christmas/New Year. You need to be very good to get out of Ireland, but if you don't get it first time round you could try again after getting the diploma.

coolperson05

For professional performance studies you'd really have to go abroad. RIAM would give you a good start but their standards aren't extremely high either.
The academy in London or RSAMD in Glasgow would be good bets. I am studying music at the moment and am a competent piano player (I've 2 diplomas) but Ireland isn't the place for performance unfortunately!

StrawberryJazz

I generally agree with what has been said (particularly about going abroad), I know at 16/17 its difficult to just give up on your dreams.

Although there are no performance degrees at trinity (and if you want to throw all your eggs in one basket you really should go abroad), you might consider the degree in Music Education, which is very performance heavy.

It involves only one music lecture in trinity itself which is History of Music (very heavy academically) but the rest of your music lectures will be in either the RIAM or DIT conservatory. Both institutions have amazing teachers and you'll get an hour of piano and about half an hour keyboard a week. You also have a choice to major in performance which involves more tuition.:)

If you don't want to give up music but cant stand the thought of a purely theoretical degree, I would recommend this course. However, the education part of it (taught in tcd and riam/dit) is very heavy too and you would have to be interested in teaching at some point of your life to even stick it out a year.

scottg4life

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=69894414#post69894414

StrawberryJazz

scottg4life wrote: »

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=69894414#post69894414

Do you know how many kids do grade six every year?

scottg4life

StrawberryJazz wrote: »

Do you know how many kids do grade six every year?

What do you mean by this??