Pearson Edexcel GCSE Music: February 2024 update

In this update

PAS, CAS and Administrative Support Guide

Entry codes

Difficulty level booklet

Training and Support

Key dates

PAS, CAS and Administrative Support Guide

You can now find the latest versions of the PAS and CAS forms online. This includes both editable PDFs and Excel versions. Please ensure that you use these versions of the forms with submissions by 15 May 2024.

There is also a new version of the Administrative Support Guide. This details how to run and manage assessments this year.

You can also find a link to the form that you must complete if any candidates are under the required length for either performing (4 minutes) or composing (3 minutes).

Exam entries for May/June 2024

Exam entries for May/June 2024 assessment must be made by 21 February 2024. After this date, late entry fees may be charged. Please note that your exams officer will have their own internal deadlines in order to get the information necessary to make entries.

The entry code for GCSE Music is 1MU0. However, there are some option codes for any students resitting the qualification who wish to carry forward marks from the previous series.

Difficulty level booklet

As part of our ongoing work to support centres delivering Pearson Edexcel Music qualifications, we are updating the Pearson Edexcel GCSE and A level Music Difficulty Levels Booklet (DLB). The updated document will be uploaded to the website shortly after 15 May, 2024 and will be used for assessments from the 2025 summer examination series onwards. The current DLB, available on our website, will be used for assessment in the 2024 summer examination series. 

The updated DLB will mostly include additional pieces from recently published practical performance syllabi across a range of music exam boards. The difficulty level of a small number of pieces in the current DLB will change in this update, with some going up in difficulty level and some coming down. We advise centres to check the difficulty level of all performance repertoire carefully when preparing students for 1MU0/01 and 9MU0/01 assessments in 2025 and onwards, even in cases where centres have submitted performances of the same piece year on year. 

By uploading the updated version of the DLB after the 2024 coursework deadline, we hope this will give centres the longest possible time to prepare students for the following examination series. 

If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Training and Support

We are repeating the training events we ran last term during this term as well. There are Coursework Marking Training events for Performing and Composing, and a training event for Effective Strategies for teaching the GCSE Music Appraising paper.

Book a place on a training event

To support you with submitting NEA work for 15 May, I am arranging a support session to go through the process. This is on Monday 25 March 4pm - 5pm.

Register on the LWT Support Session

We have produced a new guidance to support you with ensemble performance requirements. This includes a video and examples explaining the requirements.

Access the ensemble requirements guidance

Key dates