BOSTES 2009 HSC Music 1 Aural Skills - Markers Guidelines and Feedback

In better responses, candidates:

• identified up to four layers within the music in a detailed and descriptive analysis of the excerpt
• demonstrated an excellent understanding of musical terminology
• demonstrated an understanding of the relationship between the concepts, such as links between tone colour and texture
• incorporated other concepts of pitch and structure in order to expand more on texture and tone colour, for example, ‘high-pitched metallic tone colour’ and ‘first layer of sound provides melodic ostinato’
• provided well-structured responses in which the chronological order of each section was clearly identified.

In weaker responses, candidates:

• provided brief and superficial responses
• structured answers poorly and included irrelevant or poorly labelled diagrams
• could not identify the three key layers within the excerpt
• frequently used little or incorrect musical terminology
• often described the instruments’ origins rather than tone colour – for example, ‘Asian instrument’
• identified changes in texture by mentioning changes in layers but did not specify when these changes occurred
• described only one aspect of the question in detail, such as texture, without mentioning tone colour
• provided narrative story responses such as raindrops, peasants dancing, journeys, rather than factual musical observations
• did not relate point forms to the actual music.