Reference · older material
Everything that is not today's practice: the exam rules, corrections, and the older study documents and flash cards.
The rules in AMEB's own words: the 25–40 minute programme, what Lists A/B/C/D really mean, clean copies for the examiners, page turns, memory, and a pre-flight checklist.
CorrectionsWhat was wrong in the original study documents, how it was fixed, and what still needs checking against your own edition.
Short version below; the full rules — quoted from AMEB's own syllabus, with the exact wording — are on the Syllabus page.
25–40 minutes of music, including appropriate gaps between pieces — that is the syllabus's own wording (2026 edition), and 25 is a floor, not a target. Two examiners listen, and they may hear "the whole or any portion" of any piece.
The whole exam is booked for 50 minutes, so whatever your programme doesn't use is discussion time — with the score open in front of you. They point at the page and ask: "What's this? Why do you play it that way?"
Section I is the pieces, Section II is general knowledge. No scales, no technical work, no sight reading, no aural tests — all of those stop at Grade 8 / Certificate of Performance.
A pass (65%+) in Grade 5 Theory, Musicianship or Music Craft. It does not have to be done before the recital — but until both are passed, the diploma isn't awarded.
AMusA candidates are "encouraged to present a portion of the programme from memory." Only at LMusA does it become compulsory, and even then it's one complete work. Either way, bring the music: Section II needs it.
Award with Distinction / Award / No Award. No percentages, and no separate mark for playing and talking — they are weighed together into a single word.
Every question fits one of five boxes that the syllabus names outright: 1. Terminology (the significance of titles and the meaning of all markings in the score), 2. Composers (biography, sources of influence, impact on later generations, and repertoire output — "both in the discipline being examined and more broadly"), 3. Historical & stylistic context (the period, and the performance conventions of the time), 4. Structure (formal layout, keys, melodic/harmonic language, and the identification of climax points), and 5. The instrument (its construction and development, and what that implies for this repertoire). Each lesson in this course covers all five.
① "Candidates must provide the examiners with clear, unmarked copies of all scores." Mark up your own copy all you like; theirs must be clean, and there are two of them. ② Every work must be on the AMusA list for your sitting year, because Regulation 25 says a work that isn't prescribed "cannot be heard" — and "in diploma examinations, the absence of one or more works will result in no award being given." Check the list first, then practise. The Syllabus page walks through both →
Your study documents, ready to download or open — all in one place, and now aligned with the course: the two flashcard decks have been fully corrected against the accuracy review (see the errata page).
The two downloadable PDFs are older documents that predate this course's accuracy review, and they still contain every error the review removed — including a fake recapitulation dispute ("bar 78"), the false "chromatic fugue" nickname, "knee levers", the misattributed Bartók "jewel" quotation, and Chopin's "written first". They cannot be edited, so they stay up as background material only. Where a PDF disagrees with a lesson page or a flashcard, the PDF is wrong. The full list is on the errata page.
The overview: composers, works, form, harmony and performance practice, with the 96-question bank, model answers and four mock vivas. ⚠️ Pre-correction edition — contains known errors; see the errata page.
📄 Download · PDFThe deep dive: five official question areas, bar-by-bar analysis, rubato sources and performance background. ⚠️ Pre-correction edition — contains known errors; see the errata page.
🎴 Open · Flash cards96 questions with a 3D flip card and a progress stave — fully corrected against the accuracy review. Tap a card to reveal the answer; press Space, 1 / 2 to mark.
🎴 Open · Flash cardsA 66-question bullet-answer companion deck, filterable by composer — also corrected against the review. Press Space to reveal, 1 / 2 to mark.
Answer out loud, in sentences before you reveal — the exam tests fluency, not recognition. Then use the Practice page, or the four mock vivas.
Kept for reference. Its question bank and voice examiner were written before the newest source checks, so where they disagree with the Answer Cards, the Answer Cards win.
A knowledge base plus a mock examiner you can drop into an AI voice chat — built from this course and its errata, then fact-checked by two independent reviews (2026-10-04). It is English-first, because the real exam is an English viva.
kb/99 wins
Its errata file lists 23 myths, including 12 mistakes that were still on this very site (e.g. harpsichord vs clavichord, how to define ♭VI). Treat the flashcards above as a first draft where they conflict.
Filter by composer or difficulty, Space to reveal, 1 / 2 to mark. Includes a 38-question trap drill. English by default, Chinese on a switch.
🎤 Voice · Copy & pasteOne self-contained prompt with every fact inside. Paste what is between the ==== lines into a voice chat and it starts examining you — tell it which edition you play from.
For agents that can read files (Claude, Copilot CLI, Cursor): use as the system prompt and give access to kb/ and questions/. Marking guide: rubric.md.
164 questions with answer, trap, follow-up and a fun fact. Practise from the English one; the Chinese one is for understanding.
The highest-authority file in the kit. Section G is the second-order list: errors that survived on this site.
kb/ per-piece notes, agents/, questions/, practice/, tools/ and a README. Start with README.md.
Read a kb/ note → do one spoken, all-English mock with the voice examiner → write down what you got wrong, and the answers that were right but never reached "so this is how I play it" → check any new "error" yourself before trusting the AI.