The new Junior Cycle music course allows you to display your creativity in the two CBAs that you have to complete:

Your CBAs do NOT form part of your overall music exam result and are graded differently. The result or descriptor you achieve appears separately on your Junior Cycle Profile of Achievement. They are awarded by your class teacher in consultation with other music teachers in your school or from schools in the surrounding area.

The official definitions of the descriptors awarded are as follows:

This guide will look at what you need to do to successfully complete and score highly in your CBA I: Composition Portfolio.

CBA I will take place over the duration of your second year in school. It is designed to be a project that develops your composing skills bit by bit so that, towards the end of year two, you will have completed a variety of composing tasks. 

From this, you then choose two pieces of work you wish to submit as your composition portfolio.

The objective of the CBA is to develop your creativity in line with your musical knowledge. You need to be able to present this in a clear way so that another performer could recreate the sound as you intended. This is why your presentation is just as important as the creativity you show. 

The CBA I task is deliberately designed to be approached in an open-ended and varied way. It is hoped that all music students will approach it differently and embark on their own personal composing journey. As there is no set structure, the best way to examine it is in a question-and-answer (Q&A) format:

Your overall descriptor will be based on your teacher's assessment. This assessment takes three elements into account:

As outlined earlier, you will be awarded a descriptor according to how well your teacher deems your work to be (in consultation with others).

Teachers are asked to consider the following Features of Quality when grading CBA I. To score highly, you need to make sure your composition portfolio displays the following elements:

Any project in which you had creative input can be included. The following are some examples but this list is not exhaustive so don’t feel limited to it. You could:

• adapt or add accompaniment or an ostinato to an existing piece or song;
• create an advertisement/jingle/sonic branding for a real or imaginary product;
• create a 'soundscape' by recording various natural or man-made sounds and then bring them together using a software package that allows you to record and edit;
• write your own song/piece using instruments, voices or any available sound source;
• create a piece of music from 'found sounds';
• create a song/piece in response to a story/poem/incident, etc.

You can do it all on your own but you don’t have to. You can create as part of a group as large or as small as you like. You then pick the best two and that becomes your portfolio.

This is not an issue! The performance level does not matter. What's important is the creativity displayed, the presentation level and your own input and reflection on that input.

There are a lot of software packages out there that allow for the creation of music using a computer. These are perfectly acceptable as a medium for composition. Similarly, recording your own sounds and editing them in programmes such as Bandlab, Logic, or Audacity is also equally acceptable. Composing on an instrument is not the only way.

Your music teacher will more than likely have a lot of ideas to get you started. Remember that this is a skill you are going to develop throughout the year so don’t get disheartened at the start if things seem difficult. Start small and build your confidence. Try the following steps to get you going and grow your confidence:

There are no set guidelines for the length or complexity of the pieces you have to include. What's important is that they show originality, development of ideas, appropriate presentation and thoughtful reflection on your creative process. A one-minute piece that shows evidence of all these elements will score higher than a five-minute piece that does not.

No, you don’t. If you don’t play an instrument or feel that you can’t play well enough, you can get someone else to perform your pieces and record them playing your compositions.

There are many ways to present your compositions as we will see later. Notating them using traditional notation or graphic notation, without a recording, is equally valid and will not affect your overall descriptor award.

Once you have decided which two pieces to submit, the next step is to decide what way you wish to present it. The 'past masters' used only written means simply because that was the only one available to them.

You have a variety of ways available to you and all are equally valid. Pick the presentation style or combination of styles that you are most comfortable with and which you feel will showcase your work in the best possible way for the listener.

Your CBA I in music allows for an array of presentation methods depending on your own compositional style. You can present your portfolio in the following ways or indeed in any combination of these:

It is important to show evidence of learning, evidence of that learning being applied in a practical way and evidence of creativity. You also need to make sure that what you write in the 'reflection on your learning' section is clear and presented in detail.

No. You must also include the statement, 'reflection on your learning'. This is an opportunity for you to highlight what you learned throughout the process. To score highly, make sure you explain the following:

To ensure you achieve a high descriptor, you should remember the following: