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Chiswick Music Department is an award-winning department and has something to offer to everyone.

This page is about what we offer in our curriculum. If you want to hear more about what happens outside the classroom, please click here, or Check out our YouTube channel for more.

The ultimate aim of the department is to produce musicians. We want to help the national effort to ensure that the UK continues to have outstanding Cellists, Trumpeters, Singers, Songwriters, Music Critics, Musicology professors, and Avant-Garde composers.

The secondary aim of the department is to produce highly competent individuals who can contribute meaningfully to the musical life of their community, be that members of their local ameteur orchestra or choir, those who might perform at their local pub, or write music in their spare time, people for whom music will have a significant part, but not necessarily in a full time capacity.

The tertiary aim of the department is to ensure that everyone at Chiswick school can go into their adult life knowing that music is an essential part of what makes us human. We want everyone to leave with a working knowledge of notation, be able to play simple melodies on a piano, be able to hold a melody while singing, and be able to appreciate a wide variety of musical styles.

We achieve this in three ways, and we place equal priority on all three.

Academic Music
1-2-1 tuition
Musical opportunities

Academic Music

Everyone studies music theory to approximately an ABRSM grade 1 standard.
Everyone is taught to play simple music on the piano with two hands
Everyone is taught the basics of writing music.
Everyone is expected to know 30 pieces of music by the end of year 9. This is our Chiswick Canon
We follow the Edexcel specification for GCSE and A Level. We think that this is the most rigorous course at both levels

121 Tuition

We provide tuition in all orchestral and popular instruments as well as composition
Certificates are awarded for those students who have made most progress on their instrument
We provide every student who takes up tuition with a learning log so that they can track progress
10 students a year who are both pupil premium and musically talented receive free tuition for 3 years as well as a guaranteed place at the school

Musical opportunities

We try and perform as much as possible
We try and get as healthy balance as possible between various musical styles
We want some groups to be strongly teacher-led, while also growing a culture of student-led performances as much as possible

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