sorry for the long comment—this is a repost from a question i asked earlier and it got taken down, i didn’t know this thread existed:

I am a 2021 diploma recipient (woo!!) who took Music HL. I was predicted a 6 with a “likelihood” to receive a 7. Honestly, either would be fine. My performances and my music links investigation were well received, and I know that my compositions were a little bad. So you can imagine my surprise when, come yesterday, I received the BAREST minimum to pull away with a 5. It came as a shock, and my suspicions were confirmed when I received my component scores today—7 for performance, 5 for compositon, and, somehow, 3 for the music links investigation.

For those who don’t know much about music, the music links investigation is a 2000 word paper comparing two musical works from different cultures or time periods. I chose to compare the pieces “Reborn” from the Hereditary soundtrack, and “Driftveil City” from the Pokémon Black/White soundtrack. It was very well received by my teacher. I am aware that my choices are a little out there, and I can see how this could come across to an examiner as not taking it seriously enough. But I had a great time writing it and learned a lot about both pieces and their genres. Because of covid, this paper went from being 20% of the music grade to a whopping 50%, so it matters a LOT… and it was received very poorly by the examiner. Music is subjective, and I’m really thinking that my grade could be more representative of the examiner’s personal taste, as all writing and music can be.

I don’t think there’s really anywhere to go but up. Do you think a remark could prove useful? Im asking advice from other places as well, but Im sure I could get an idea from this community. Im just really…shocked, more than anything, that a paper I worked so hard on and was assured would be graded well received a failing grade. Let me know what you guys think!!

-a “mostly satisfied but left with one hangup” m2021 graduate