I noticed most colleges have accompanists for auditions, but ran into one today that doesn’t seem to and says to have a CD of your music…did most of you that have already auditioned, record your music with an accompanist on your phone etc or did you just find backtracks for your music online and use those. I would think I will almost have to have D’s friend play all the cuts and record them as we sometimes have trouble finding backtracks for songs online…I am having a lot of stress about this as there are going to be quite a few songs I would guess and I am no techie. I dont even know if my iphone is sufficient for recording the tracks…
Our accompanist had software to record on his computer from his piano and then gave us mp3’s. We know many accompanists can do this, and the quality is usually higher than just trying to record it on your phone. Maybe find someone local who has the capabilities to do this?
@theaterwork I’m sending you a PM with a recommendation.
We used tracks purchased from piano trax dot com or from accompaniment CD’s that came with the Singer’s Musical Theatre Anthology books. We did editing where necessary with Audacity (free music editing software used by many professionals).
Many people have their accompanist record the tracks for them.
You can record piano tracks with a phone, but if the room is very “live” you may have to spend some time to get the placement correct for decent sound quality. Phone mics are omnidirectional so they will pick up all background sounds, particularly A/C fan/duct noise that you might otherwise not notice (this can be a real problem in some school or church rooms). The Rode VideoMic Me Directional Microphone for Smart Phones is a really cool and relatively inexpensive way ($68) to solve most phone microphone problems.
You will need at least four tracks: Golden Age uptempo and ballad and Contemporary uptempo and ballad in 16 and 32 bar cuts plus the full songs (that’s 12 tracks total). Some schools go by time, not bars, so you will need to check the timing to meet requirements for 30 second, 45 seconds, 1 minute, 2 minutes etc., depending on the requirements of the schools on your list. This may result in some additional tracks. Depending on which schools are on your list, you may need additional songs (like an Art Song for Belmont, for example). It does pay to have a couple of extra songs ready, occasionally schools ask, “what else have you got that you can sing for us?” (although they will usually allow you to sing a capella in those circumstances if they don’t have an accompanist).
It really pays to get on this during June or July so that you are ready to record prescreens early in the fall.
I think that CD’s are mostly passe at this point - students bring the music on their phones and then play it through a portable speaker, however, its not a bad idea to have the CD ready if you need it.
Getting the piano tracks done was way easier than recording the video prescreens.
My daughter’s voice teacher had the same capability that @stagedoormama accompanist had.
The accompanist we used for pre-screens also recorded music for auditions. Search “pre-screens” on this forum and you will find a lot of ideas. 