Where the 140 marks go
AS Music (Unit AS 3, Responding to Music) is assessed by two equally weighted papers: Paper 1, a Test of Aural Perception (70 marks, 60 minutes), and Paper 2, a Written Examination (70 marks, 120 minutes). Paper 2 is built from four questions: a 20-mark score-based question on your set work from Music for Orchestra, 1700 to 1900, a 20-mark question on an unfamiliar printed score, and two 15-mark extended essays, one on Sacred Vocal Music (Anthems) and one on Secular Vocal Music (Musicals). Paper 1 asks two questions on unfamiliar music and three on your prescribed set-work extracts, all by ear.
Across both papers, the examiner reports point to one recurring problem above the rest: incomplete chord and harmony labelling. A chord answer that gives only the root note, with no quality or inversion, forfeits half to all of the mark, even when the root is correct.
Paper by paper
Paper 1 gives 60 minutes for 70 marks, distributed across five questions, two on unfamiliar extracts and three on your set works, each played several times with pauses between hearings. Use the gaps between playings to commit your answer to paper rather than trying to hold it in your head until the extract stops.
Paper 2 gives 120 minutes for 70 marks, close to 103 seconds per mark. A working split: 34 minutes for Question 1's 20-mark set-work score analysis, 34 minutes for Question 2's 20-mark unfamiliar score analysis, and 26 minutes each for Questions 3 and 4, the 15-mark essays on Anthems and Musicals. That leaves nothing spare, so decide your chord inversions and cadence types on your first read of the score, not while writing up the answer.
Chord grids: give the full answer, not just the root
Harmonic identification questions credit the full chord: root, quality and inversion. Writing B when the answer is B7, second inversion, loses most or all of the mark, even though the root you named is correct. Work through a chord grid systematically: find the bass note, work out the interval above it to identify the chord's root, name its quality, major, minor, dominant seventh, diminished, and state the inversion last.
Cadences and pedal points under aural conditions
Plagal (IV to I) and perfect (V to I) cadences are the pair most often confused by ear, along with imperfect cadences that end on the dominant. Listen for the bass line's final two chords specifically, not the general sense of resolution, since a plagal cadence can sound conclusive without being a perfect one. The same discipline applies to pedal points: check whether the sustained note is the dominant or the tonic, especially where the harmony above it is moving through a modulation.
Two misconceptions about the set works
Not every Classical symphony launches straight into a fast sonata-form exposition. Mozart's Symphony No. 39 opens with a slow introduction before the Allegro begins, and treating the whole first movement as uniformly fast will cost you marks on any question about its structure.
A musical theatre number does not hold one metre or texture throughout. Numbers from the set musical extracts shift between metres, for example alternating 4/4 and 2/4, or moving into a dance rhythm such as a Beguine, to track the drama on stage. Listen across the whole extract for these shifts rather than assuming the opening bars describe the whole piece.
The 15-mark essays: name the bar, not the mood
Questions 3 and 4 mark against specific technical evidence, not general impressions of mood or lyrics. Cite bar numbers, named instruments doubling or imitating the melody, and specific harmonic devices, sequence, inversion, diminution, stretto, rather than describing how a passage feels. Both bulleted domains in the question, melody and harmony for instance, need developed coverage; an essay that writes at length about melodic contour and only a sentence about harmony will not reach the top band even if the melodic analysis is excellent.
The week before
For every set work, write out the chord grid of a key passage from memory, checking quality and inversion, not just the root. Practise telling plagal, perfect and imperfect cadences apart by ear using short extracts, and for Questions 3 and 4, draft a two-domain plan, one column for each bulleted requirement, before you write a single sentence of prose.