Leaving Cert: music Teachers in Dublin chimed with colleagues in Donegal on the notes of contention in the higher-level Leaving Cert (listening) music paper.
Berlioz's Symphony may have been Fantastique but Question 1 (section b) certainly wasn't. When asked: "What rhythmic figure is played by the harps in bars 85-87?" many of the 5,000 students who sat the paper were likely to have been confused.
The correct answer was "triplets", but many students wrote "arpeggio". Unfortunately, an arpeggio is a melodic figure, not a rhythmic one.
Music teacher Ms Evelyn Hearns, of Alexandra College, Dublin, and a TUI representative, thought it would have been better to use the phrase "compositional figure" instead. She intends to query it with the State Examinations Commission.
Mr Kevin Fitzsimons, music teacher at the Royal and Prior Secondary School in Raphoe, Co Donegal, said that most of his students were also caught by the ambiguity of the question.
Question 2 also raised some problems, said Ms Hearns. Referring to an excerpt from the Beatles song, When I'm 64, students were asked whether, in the third line, the clarinets were playing: (a) the melody with the singer; (b) crotchets in harmony; or (c) a countermelody.
The closest "correct" answer was "countermelody", even though it is debatable if this is an apt description because the clarinets are static in this passage.
Ms Hearns also plans to raise this with the commission.
Question 5 (b), meanwhile, was clearly designed to separate the A1s from the rest of the musicians.
Ms Hearns and Mr Fitzsimons agreed that all four choices were unusually challenging.
Other than that, the paper was a "gem", Ms Hearns declared.
Mr John Francis Murphy, ASTI representative, commented that growing numbers of students are doing Leaving Cert music - 500 more this year than last.
Yesterday's paper will encourage even more to do so next year, he said. When fifth years saw the paper, they would realise how manageable it was, he said.
The higher-level (composing) music paper wasn't quite a jig, but almost.
Music students have a choice of how earn their marks. For example, if a student chooses the performance element, this is worth 50 per cent of the mark. The next two elements, listening and composition, are worth 25 per cent each.
If a pupil chooses listening as the 50 per cent element, then performance and composition are worth 25 per cent each.
There were no major problems with the ordinary-level paper, taken by one in four students.
It was a long day for the students, with listening (core) from 9.30 a.m. to 12.30 p.m. and composition from 2-3.30 p.m. There was also an elective listening element from 11.15 a.m. to noon, making the music exam the longest in the entire Leaving Cert.