Intrigued by the Guitar – Felicia’s RSL Merit

Felicia Irene Deborah initially wanted to learn keyboard. She took up the guitar instead.

“I wanted to learn keyboard, but got intrigued with guitar and decided to take a plunge,” she says.

After 18 months of learning at Trill Route, that plunge had a result attached to it: a Merit in the RSL Entry Level Award in Graded Certificate in Music Performance (Entry 3) for Acoustic Guitar, dated 30 June 2026.

Felicia with her RSL Rockschool Certificate.

What she wanted from lessons

What she asked for from lessons was theory. In her words, she wanted to learn “not just playing guitar chords but theory and notes” - and that is the kind of request a teacher can build a real syllabus around.

She is in Class 10. Outside music, she enjoys cooking. And when she plays at home, she says, she feels “so relaxed and out of this world”.

Getting the timing right

The part Felicia set out to master before the exam was timing, and she went at it directly.

“Getting the timing right was the hardest part, and I was helped by my tutor,” she says.

Felicia says her tutor, Abhinav, was patient, and worked with her on hearing where the beat sat and on the emphasis of individual notes. That work had somewhere specific to go. The three songs she prepared were Bill Withers’ “Ain’t No Sunshine”, “Yours” and The Lumineers’ “Ho Hey”, all played to a backing track - which puts the timing on show, because the track keeps its own tempo whatever the player does.

What the examiner said

She took the exam as a video graded certificate, recorded and submitted rather than played in a room with an examiner. When the report came back it answered the exact thing she had been anxious about. The examiner wrote that “sync, time and pulse were solid and secure for most part” across her performance pieces, and singled out her articulation of melody lines and scales as secure and accurate. The part she had worried about most turned out to be one of the parts she was praised for.

The result

She started nervous and finished, in her words, “pleasantly happy with the result” - a Merit, 18 months in, on an instrument she chose for herself rather than the one she first had in mind.

Congratulations, Felicia.

Guitar lessons at Trill Route in Indiranagar, Bangalore run one-on-one and in duos, for complete beginners through to graded-exam students - you can see how they work on our guitar lessons page.