BOSTES 2012 HSC Music 1 Aural Skills - Markers Guidelines and Feedback

In better responses, candidates:

• wrote clear and cohesive answers
• clearly defined the layers and how they were used
• used appropriate and clearly labelled diagrams
• made use of accurate and representative graphic notation
• identified layers and their relationship to each other
• related layers to musical structure, clearly anchoring points to the excerpt
• supported their statements with appropriate musical examples
• used music terminology correctly
• accurately described the different ostinato rhythms.

In weaker responses, candidates:

• confused performance techniques such as tonguing the violin or plucking the vibraphone
• generalised musical events rather than providing musical detail
• were repetitive in their answers and only referred to limited layers
• presented disjointed and poorly constructed answers
• described musical events in terms of stories or emotional responses
• did not draw appropriate conclusions
• identified tone colours but did not relate these to the layers of sound
• used diagrams that were irrelevant and not clearly referenced to the music