Rockschool Vocals – Wider Repertoire

Choosing your own songs for Rockschool Vocals exams:

Students wishing to sit vocal exams with Rockschool are required to purchase a book containing all the exercises that need to be prepared, plus the music and backing tracks for six songs at the specified grade.  But, if you read carefully, students can actually choose to sing alternative pieces, either of their own selection or taken from a list of ‘wider repertoire’ that Rockschool themselves publish on their website.  For the RSL most updated list, click on this link: https://www.rslawards.com/wider-repertoire/

Recently RSL has removed the gender categories on their list of songs – all songs are now performable by all candidates, irrespective of gender – I consider this a positive move forward. If you choose to perform a song that is not on the RSL recommended list then you need to consider whether that song meets the difficulty criteria that’s published in the relevant Rockschool Vocal Grade singing book. Here you’ll find a list of requirements for own choice pieces, including details about the vocal range and the melodic intervals that are used in the voice part. If you want to do a particular song in your exam but don’t know how to tell whether it meets the requirements for the grade that you’re working on, you could always book a Zoom session with me – I can check whether the song you’ve chosen is an appropriate difficulty level, and suggest alternatives should there be a need. Just use the button below to get booked in:

Remember that you can perform any song in the key of your choice, as long as you are able to provide a copy of the sheet music and a backing track in that key. So, if you have a song in mind but you find that it goes too high or too low for your voice, you can switch this to a more comfortable pitch. Again, this is something that I can help you with if you’re not sure how to do it – do note that candidates for these exams are required to provide 2 copies of the sheet music and a backing track for their own choice songs, and all of this must be legally sourced.

For more information about singing lessons / vocal coaching with me, either online via Zoom, or in person here in Skipton, take a look at THIS LINK.