Okay, so the other day I entered myself to do Grade 7 theory in November. I had bought the books etc. for it a few years ago but never got around to sitting it because my instrumental teacher at the time wasn't really up to teaching me the stuff. Looking through the books, I found that I had picked up a lot of the stuff over the years anyway, so I decided to just go for it.

I do still think I would benefit from having a teacher to look over my work, however. The problem is that I don't know of anyone who can teach me this stuff well and am not really sure where to look to find someone good.

Any Ideas?

I live near Glasgow, by the way.

You could start with the musicteachers web site. If you do the following search:

Keywords: Glasgow Dip
Instrument: theory
Area: Strathclyde

it brings up 14 teachers who (presumably) all teach theory and are qualified to Diploma level.

http://www.musicteachers.co.uk/search?mode...y&region=54

It's a start anyway...



Edit: When I was looking for a new theory teacher, I started a thread asking what qualifications I should look for. If you think it might be useful, have a look at this thread.

2nd Edit: Having read the above thread again, I'm not sure that searching for "Dip" is the right thing to do. It might be better to search for different qualifications

Thanks Skylark, that's very helpful. Looks like you didn't really get a definitive answer to the question of what qualifications to look for in a theory teachers. Did you manage to find a teacher you're happy with?

I think maybe the best way is just to phone around some of the names that look the best qualified and just ask them if they do teach up to grade 8 theory.

You could try ringing your local sixth form college and asking to speak to the head of music. These people generally have a few private pupils outside school. S/he'll be delighted to find someone enthusiastic and at/approaching that level.

I'm doing G7 in November too.

Thanks for the advice, Alicia, but unfortunately we don't have such a thing as sixth form colleges in Scotland. And I'm doubtful whether any of the teachers from my old secondary school would be up to teaching me the stuff.

In the end I went to someone who I already knew as a composer (amongst other things). I finished off G4 and did G5 through this teacher and am staying with him for G6. I've said on a different thread that one of the things I like about this teacher is that he's so knowledgeable about all sorts of other aspects of music as well as formal theory. He knows all about composers (their lives and their styles), he knows about instruments and the history of music - he's very much an all-round musician and fascinating to listen to. He helps me with all sorts of other things that I get involved with, and lets me pick his brains on things that are nothing to do with theory but go towards increasing my general knowledge about music matters. For me, he been a very good choice.



"Best qualified" - that comes back to the meaning of "best qualified" which was discussed on the other thread. My previous theory teacher was a BMus - you'd think that was a high enough qualification to teach the lower grades, but I remember being a bit taken aback at some of things which she didn't know offhand (like whether 8ve above the notes meant you played an octave higher or lower ) and now I've been going back through my old theory papers from G1-5 to familiarise myself again with everything, I can see that she's marked quite a few of my answers at G3 and G4 level as being correct when I know now that they're not. I know you shouldn't generalise on the basis of one experience, but nevertheless it has put me off BMus as a suitable qualification for teaching theory. (Apologies to BMus people out there - I know this is a generalisation and very unfair, but it's been my experience and rightly or wrongly I've been influenced by that ).

Slight digression but I've read recently that a student can get Music GCSE/A level (I forget which) without being able to read music notation It just goes to show that qualifications at whatever level can be very misleading.

If I was looking again, I would look for a composer and a pianist because harmony is so important at the higher grades. My teacher often plays something on the piano to demonstrate, and I'm hoping now that I'm learning piano that it will make more sense to me.

The good news is, I think, that if you can find a higher-grade theory teacher, s/he is likely to be an enthusiastic theorist and not just teaching theory because students need the lower grades in order to move on.

Good luck with your search, I hope you find someone suitable