A MUSICAL ASSESSMENT

The New Zealand Music Examinations Board (NZMEB) is a national alternative for music assessment, celebrating and advancing Aotearoa New Zealand music standards.

NZMEB offers examinations at various levels and stages of musical development. It also assesses musical performance at NCEA Levels 1, 2 and 3, providing an opportunity for all entrants to have their musical achievements recognised and recorded on the NZQA Record of Learning. NZMEB offers a wide range of syllabuses for piano, strings (violin, viola, cello), woodwind (recorder, flute, clarinet, oboe, bassoon), brass (trumpet, trombone, saxophone), singing, musical theatre, theory, and chamber music.

NZMEB + NZQA = WIN-WIN!

Students may stop learning a musical instrument because their parents want them to focus on academic studying to gain a 'Scholarship' and 'University Entrance'. The connection between studying a musical instrument with the possibility of gaining a scholarship to university is missed. NZMEB's approach to exams and assessments are approved by NZQA to ensure they meet NCEA requirements. All NZMEB exams and assessments are moderated by teachers used to assessing and moderating NCEA. Every NZMEB examination can earn NCEA credits which contribute directly towards potential scholarships and the coveted NZ University Entrance.

NZMEB Practical Exam Grade 3 is an acceptable equivalent to NCEA Level 1
NZMEB Practical Exam Grades 4 and 5 are acceptable equivalents to NCEA Level 2
NZMEB Practical Exam Grade 6 is an acceptable equivalent to NCEA Level 3

HOLISTIC APPROACH

There are no 'marks' as such. Instead, the examiner provides 'commentary' based on their learnings, insights and comments from the examination. And wherever possible, there is a specialised examiner providing specialised feedback (e.g. a pianist for piano exams, instead of a flautist for piano, woodwind, and brass exams which is often the case for international examination boards).

Each grade percentile has an equivalent written narrative.

For example, a B+ equates to 75%. All NZMEB grade exams have four distinct elements, these are a demonstration of:

Pieces of Music (repertoire),
Technical Work (scales, etc),
Musical Knowledge (about the pieces played and should help inform the performance),
Musicianship (recognising the three building blocks of music: 1) rhythm, 2) pitch, 3) harmony, and Sight-reading). We do not ask entrants to sing in the Musicianship tests!

In the next blog post, we will discuss the two distinct 'streams' in NZMEB's approach to exams: 1) Performance, 2) Standard.