<p>Hey Zep, were we separated at birth or what?</p>
<p>Just a note about vocal auditions -- the advice D received was to dress conservatively and to be well-groomed from head to toe. Choosing something comfortable is also important so that there is no constriction on the diaphragm. D chose a classic black dress, pearls, and moderate-hight heels. She always wore hose and closed-toe shoes. On more than one occasion, the faculty commented (positively) on her aesthetic presentation. </p>
<p>We saw a range of clothing but I do think it has an impact on the judging -- perhaps more in vocal that in instrumental auditions. Boys were typically in sweaters and trousers/dockers and leather shoes. We saw a few suits but that was not typical. </p>
<p>I agree about trying to be in the "middle" if you have a choice. At one of D's violin auditions, it was -17 (actual temp) and she was first. Her fingers were still very cold just from walking from the car to the conservatory. It wasn't ideal. It turned out ok but she would have preferred to have "warm" fingers for her audition!</p>
<p>This is wonderful information and will be really helpful, so thank you! One further question is whether most people play from memory or with their music? Also, at schools where specific pieces are not required, are you expected to provide the judges a copy of your pieces?</p>
<p>ASW, I have heard some folks say that playing from memory is not required. However, in checking websites, I have seen that it is required that pieces be memorized for certain schools (this is for piano). It's a heck of a big repertoire too. </p>
<p>PS How do you know what audition number you are? Do they say, "You are playing 7th", and you just assume that it is around 11:00?</p>
<p>Check individual school websites. Most list the audition requirements. To be perfectly honest, I don't recall a vocal audition where music was allowed. Everything was done from memory. This may not be the case w/instruments.</p>
<p>My son is a cellist. He did all his rep from memory. It wasn't required at all schools but strongly recommended. The exception was his sonata which is considered chamber music and typically not memorized. I think that memorizing gives a better impression overall, even if not required.</p>
<p>For instrumentalists, solo pieces like concerti are frequently required to be played from memory, as they would be at a performance. Orchestral excerpts are always played from printed music. Scales and arpeggios, while not often asked for, should always be played from memory. Etudes can go either way, but you generally have to memorize them to be able to do a good job with them in any event. If you are not certain, call or email the teacher at the school and ask.</p>
<p>It is always a good idea to have an original, legal copy of the printed music along with you to give to the judges should they need it. Again, if in doubt contact the school.</p>
<p>Schools handle audition signups in different ways. Some assign a time after receiving the application, some ask you to call a department secretary after a certain date to arrange an appointment, some have extensive computer systems where you can sign yourself up for any available time slot, some have everyone show up first thing in the morning and draw lots for a time slot. They are all quite specific about an appointed time, but some are better than others at keeping to their own schedules.</p>
<p>There is nothing you can do about the weather. We too arrived the night before everywhere we went for auditions with DS. Our Peabody audition was the audition from H****. You may all recall that there was a HUGE snowstorm president's day weekend in 2003. Well, the Peabody auditions were supposed to be on that Monday...president's day. BUT the whole city of DC was shut down and snowed in due to 30 some inches of snow. They actually postponed the auditions...to either Tuesday or Wednesday. Still, there were many faculty members and auditionees who did not have flights they could arrive on. The airports were closed. My favorite story was a man who flew from CA to Pittsburgh and then rented some huge four wheel drive vehicle and drove to Baltimore with his kiddo. He was going to do the reverse when the audition ended. They kept switching kids times around to try to accommodate the late arrivals. It was something.
Re: BU...DS (who goes there) also auditioned on campus but he had a live committee (three faculty members). The audition was also taped, but people were there too. His audition was combined with his BUTI audition so maybe that was the reason. There were tons of people around to give tours of the CFA (and yes, it's not very impressive). The NEC audition was just that...an audition. DS checked in, warmed up, played, and we left. There was nothing else going on (we had already seen "the dorm"). The most organized audition day we attended together was at Duquesne. The kids and the parents received schedules for their 1/2 day of audition "stuff" when they checked in. It ran like a top. Also, the Duquesne folks made arrangements for anyone who wanted to do so to attend a Pittsburgh Symphony Concert at no cost (of course WE didn't know that and bought our tickets online). In addition, faculty was available for lessons the day after the auditions (their auditions are on Fridays...DS had two lessons on Saturday with two different teacher...he liked them both). DS did a private audition with the UNT trumpet teacher which was done in the summer prior to senior year (that was really convenient). Oh...the Hartt School...if your kid auditions there, there is no need for the parents to go at all. There is NOTHING for the parents to do, and unless they've changed things...no where to even sit around (although I did personally speak to the Hartt School faculty friends I have and they agreed there needed to be a change...maybe that has happened). To be honest, I don't think you can judge the quality of the school or program based on the auditions.</p>
<p>Hate to contradict my "lost brother" BassDad, but no institutions that D auditioned for in clarinet even made a hint that they wanted things memorized. Most actually made a point of reminding people to bring music. </p>
<p>Now that was the case with concerti, orchestral excerpts and Etudes. Scales are expected to be memorized and the number of octaves one needs to run is usually substantial...</p>
<p>Of course, if you have things memorized, that is probably bonus points, but if that would add pressure and possibly detract from your audition, and the institution doesn't require it, I'd go along with bringing the music.</p>
<p>All of D's vocal auditions had to be memorized. </p>
<p>She took music for violin auditions and referred to it when needed.</p>
<p>For S's jazz instrumental auditions, all selections were played from memory. For preparation, both for pre-screening purposes and for the actual auditions, he prepared Juilliard's required audition repetoire. Most schools, even the ones that pre-screened, simply asked for three selections in contrasting styles, whereas Juilliard required six selections, each to be chosen from one of two options. That covered the bases for all schools, which was good because S's list kept changing. </p>
<p>S ended up having three live auditions--the first a one-on-one with the teacher with no accompaniment, but I think they played together. He was also required to play a classical selection. For the second, he was required to play three jazz selections with a rhythm section, but had no theory exam. The third involved the works-- first a theory exam, then three selection with a rhythm section and sight reading. </p>
<p>The first was local and we drove up that morning. It was in February, which was the first of two scheduled audition dates at this school. As most applicants had opted for the second date, there was a light schedule and the teacher asked S to wait until he completed his remaining auditions, and then spent a about 45 minutes talking with him and giving him pointers. The last two were in New York, but on different dates. I let S go alone to the first one. He flew out very early in the morning for his early afternoon slot, then went immediately to the airport and flew back home. For the last one, which was the most important to him, I went with him and we flew out the day before. </p>
<p>The process was very orderly in each case. I would suggest that if at all possible, avoid travelling on the day of.</p>
<p>While it varies from school to school and instrument to instrument, let me speak to flute since I recently looked up the web pages and checked on audition requirements for that. I looked at over 2 dozen schools including most of the top schools. Only 3 mentioned memorizations and two schools CCM and NCSA it was for one piece. Curtis said music should be played from memory if possible. Not sure how much weight if any other schools would give to someone playing from memory if not doing so would eliminate you from Curtis. My guess is at best its a tie breaker. After all orchestras rarely play without music in front of them. Again voice and piano maybe entirely different.</p>
<p>I also found only about 4 or 5 schools that pre-screened by recordings and I believe 1 or 2 only pre screened for flutes, another only for a few instruments. Again instrument and school may vary. Most schools make this information very easy to find, some I needed to search through a dozen pages to get it.</p>
<p>I keep hoping to find a reference to how many kids each school takes in a year. I have had no luck, and frankly I am not certain it makes that much difference.</p>
<p>I also found it interesting that some schools mentioned auditions were for 10 minutes. Talk about better make a good first impression. They have to be stopping people very early in some pieces to get them all in that quickly.</p>
<p>What is so frustrating about the ten minute audition is that the audition repertoire is so lengthy. I am certain that my son's classical repertoire is about an hour of memorized material (could be more, with a complete sonata, two pieces that are three movements, etc).</p>
<p>Allmusic, how come your son's classical repertoire may be more than an hour? It is not really advisable to choose long pieces due to the nature of auditions - so choose a Prelude and Fugue rather than a complete Suite by Bach, choose a shorter sonata rather than the Hammerklavier (which is like one hour...), choose a substantial romantic composition like the Chopin Ballade or Liszt Hungarian Rhapsody rather than a Chopin sonata or the Liszt b minor sonata, and so on. Length really don't imply how good you play, and the judges would not be impress by a big piece on your audition program unless the part they heard really impressed them. Doing well on a shorter piece is much, much better than struggling with a longer piece and, at the end, having not enough time to polish everything. The only school that requires length for piano performance is Juilliard, and that is only 45 minutes (unless they changed it for this year). </p>
<p>I don't know if this works for other instruments, but for piano, from what I experienced and what I heard from others who also audtioned at several music schools, they usually ask the students to start at the beginning of everything. e.g. they usually don't ask students to jump from place to place, which is very fortunate. Many schools also give you the choice of the first piece, so choose that piece wisely because 1) it's the first impression thing; 2) it is probably the piece they will heard the most, while they probably will cut you very soon in the rest of your program. </p>
<p>Practice the beginning of every piece very hard, because that is probably the only thing the judges will hear. That brings about the problem of choosing repertoire that has the "right" opening. Alas I did the Chopin Fantasy for my audition, which has a very hard, but also very, very slow opening, and the piece does not get going until 3 or 4 minuets. It's a magnificent piece, and the piece as a whole really can showcase the pianist's musicality, techniques, organization, etc. etc., but the opening shows very little because it's so slow. So I got stopped before the second theme comes in by all schools except Peabody, in which, luckily I got to play almost 1/2 of the pieces (essentially before the repetition starts).</p>
<p>thzxcyl,
So do you think a person who chooses Chopin's Andante Spianato and Grande Polonaise brillante is doomed? It is D's signature piece and it is 15 minutes long. As you know, the first 5 minutes is the andante part. So you don't think the faculty will cut short the andante and ask her to play a little bit of the polonaise? How about Bach's prelude and fugue? Were you asked to play the fugue or only prelude? A former student of her piano teacher's was asked to only play the prelude everywhere she auditioned. Then again, the prelude she played is pretty difficult (WTC I g minor).</p>
<p>How about the sonata? Were you asked to play the beginning of every movement or only the first movement? If the contemporary piece is a sonata form, are you required to present all movements? Only IU specifically said so. </p>
<p>Also, can you tell me in more detail about how each school's audition was conducted. You can PM me if you prefer.</p>
<p>It's a different case with pieces that have distinct parts (like multi-movement sonatas, Chopin's Andante Spianato and Grande Polonaise brillante and Bach Prelude and Fugue), because I don't see why the judegs won't ask you to start right at the polonaise (or the fugue) if that is what they want to hear. And if you want, you can actually offer to start with the polonaise as your first piece. I don't know what they do with the preludes and fugues, because I actually chose to start with the fugue in every audition (I played a pretty hard 5-voice fugue, and that's my favourite and best piece). </p>
<p>For sonatas, it depends on what piece you play as well as what schools, who happens to be presiding the audition, etc., so nothing can be sure. Make sure that you play learn every movements if you have a multi-movement work. From what I can recall, most schools require you to prepare the complete work (so that means all movements), so it may be wise not to choose a sonata beside the required Haydn/Mozart/Beethoven/Schubert sonata. </p>
<p>I played a Mozart sonata for my auditions, I think (sorry my memory is not working that well) in all except one auditions I was asked to play only the first movement, and none asked for the third mvt (which is actually very hard...).</p>
<p>One thing about the contemporary piece: it is probably the last thing they want to hear, so they would either don't ask for it at all or ask for it at the very end and stop you after a few bars.</p>
<p>OK, despite what I said, don't JUST prepare the opening of each piece even though that is probably very important. Learn and polish everything, try to make everything as perfect as you can, even at the ending, because 1) you never know if some school will ask you to play the coda (the probability is small but it can still happen); 2) believe it or not, having a integral idea of the piece is pretty much prerequisite to playing a good opening. </p>
<p>I'll pass on one of the greatest advice I ever had: perform your entire audition program in front of public at least 10 times before your auditions. So organize recitals at your school, your church, for your family and friends, for retirement centers, for any random people. I know it sounds funny and impossible (I thought the same the first time I heard this), but I ended up having 8 or 9 recitals of my audition program and, even though it not quite 10 recitals, they helped tremendously. By the time I got to play for the auditions, it is like another recital, and the pressure is much, much less.</p>
<p>Thzxcyl, my son is preparing the Ginistera sonata (the second movement is much like an etude) which is his favorite of all the audition pieces. He loves to play it, and without letting mother's usual lack of modesty interfere, he plays it splendidly. What a shame if no one really cares about the contemporary piece!</p>
<p>He is also preparing Bach's Italian Concerto (Oberlin doesn't require a fugue, and he was already nearly done with this Bach anyway). So, he does have too many pieces of too many movements (when you add in the Beethoven Sonata), no question. Fortunately, he is only a junior, and memorizes well, but he should talk to his teacher about perhaps picking a shorter Baroque (I know he won't give up the Ginistera!).</p>
<p>I don't know how kids get through their senior year of HS with all the time requirements of getting into a conservatory or quality University program.</p>
<p>Allmusic, it is not that nobody cares about the contemporary piece, but compare to the very foundation of a classical sonata and Bach, I think the schools care more about those than the contemporary piece since if you get in, they will make you play a bunch of ultra-contemporary pieces any way : ) </p>
<p>But there is nothing wrong, if you son really want his Ginistera be heard, to start with that piece. I started with the Bach fugue because I love it most dearly among my audition program (OK, also because I <em>think</em> a 5-voice fugue played well is impressive, but that's secondary), so seize the opportunity of starting with whatever you want.</p>
<p>FluteMom: Senior year was definitely a nightmare : ) Especially for all those poor double-degree aspirers who has to prepare for auditions, rack their brains to produce great applications to those impossibly selective schools, and carry a heavy high school workload. AND then the anxiety of waiting... Ah, I definitely don't want to get through all of those again.</p>