We have high expectations of all of our Performing Arts students and aim to challenge you to achieve outstanding results. Excellent facilities and a team of highly dedicated and committed teachers will ensure that you are provided with every chance of succeeding during your time at College. At QMC professional equipment and facilities have been carefully chosen to enhance your learning and help you acquire the skills you will need to work in the performing arts and music industries.

What do you enjoy? Composing, performing? Maybe you are interested in the more analytical side of music – how styles have developed, how a piece of music is constructed? Whichever is your preference, A Level Music has something for you as the course essentially comprises these three elements. Your performing and composing will be worth 60%, with an analysis paper which counts for 40%.

Whether you’re a budding rock star or classical instrumentalist, A-Level Music will develop your skills in performing, composing and analysing the medium you love.

The course involves performing, composing, listening to and analysing music. You will improve your skills as a performer and composer studying both ‘classical’ and ‘popular’ styles of music. You will listen to and analyse a wide variety of music, developing a more informed appreciation of how, and why, it was written. Examples of the music you will study: The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Abba, Stevie Wonder, Oasis, Metallica, Haydn, Mozart, Berlioz, Tchaikovsky, Mahler, Debussy and Stravinsky.

By studying the Music A level course, you will develop a greater understanding of how music works. You will study its creation (composing), re-creation (performing), perception (listening skills) and appreciation (knowledge and understanding). You will learn to analyse it, to understand how notes are structured into chords and into melodies, and chords and melodies into structures spanning minutes and even hours. In so doing, you will also discover how music intersects with other subjects, such as physics, geography, history and art.

A Level Music offers students an opportunity to learn and develop an understanding of music history, composition and performance. The new A- level aims to equip pupils with the necessary tools to study music at university level or potentially gain a job in the music industry. The new AS level provides the student with a solid understanding of the basic tenants of performance, composition and music history.

This course is ideal for learners who are passionate about music! Whether that may be playing an instrument or singing, if you have a love for the culture of music in its broadest sense then this course is for you. The course is designed to develop students’ existing performance and skills to the next level and fully prepare the student for a degree in music, a future in the music industry, or just for the enjoyment of studying music in more depth.

Music is at the heart of Kent College and our splendid music department offers a broad range of opportunity to pupils of all ages and abilities. Working within a positive and vibrant environment, our aim is for music to be both fun and productive, ensuring that pupils perform and progress to the best of their abilities.

The College has chosen the AQA Music A Level Music programme as it follows on seamlessly from the AQA GCSE course we offer. It is also possible to take AS Level Music and is a perfect accompaniment to other A Level Subjects. The AS Level can be taken on its own, but can then be developed into the full A Level Music by a further year at the College, as both the AS and A Level courses follow the same curriculum.

For those with proficiency on an instrument as well as openness to a number of styles, Music A level provides an excellent vehicle for the expansion and development of a musical life. Results in recent years have been outstanding and many pupils have taken the subject as part of an application profile to Russell Group and Oxbridge universities.

Music plays an important part in today’s modern world and provides the soundtrack to advertisements, films, the internet, and television. Music Technology is a combination of artistic and technological creativity and plays an important role in the development of new sound possibilities.