<p>I was wondering if anyone could comment on the Vocal Performance program within the CFA? My S will be auditioning there this coming weekend. We did a tour of the school last year, but other than a fairly impressive set of practice rooms, the tour didn’t really show much. The University tour was fairly informative though.</p>
<p>He will be applying as an incoming freshman. At many schools with sizable grad programs, it’s difficult for undergrads to get much stage time. And in many cases the undergrads are taught by grad students rather than professors? Just wondering what the case was here. Also how easy it is for someone to double major should the choose to. </p>
<p>I know it’s a rather open ended question but we’re looking for things to keep our eyes open for and develop questions we’d like to ask when he goes up for his audition.</p>
<p>I regularly check the threads under music majors as well here on CC, but the program at BU doesn’t tend to get discussed much. When it is, it seems to be held in a decent regard. </p>
<p>Thanks in advance for any info you may be able to share. Feel free to PM me if you’d rather your comments not be displayed on a public thread.</p>
<p>My daughter is an undergrad Vocal Performance major at BU. She is very happy with the VP program, with the School of Music, and with BU in general. Although BU is a large university, the School of Music is pretty small (about 200 total undergraduate music majors) and they take good care of their students. It’s a small home in the big university. CFA music majors always have their lessons with faculty, not with grad students. As for performance opportunities, there is a large graduate voice program as well as the Opera Institute which is a post-graduate certificate program. The mainstage operas are put on by Opera Institute and because of both OI and the graduate (masters) program, undergrad voice majors don’t have major roles in the operas (which wouldn’t be appropriate for a young, developing voice anyway). Sometimes a junior or senior might have a minor role but even that is unusual, though undergrads are commonly in the opera chorus. However, there are other levels of the opera program that undergrads are often part of–opera project, which has a lot of sophmores and juniors, opera workshop, and opera theater (the last one is mostly grad students however). Opera project does opera scenes programs and is open to sophomores. I don’t know all of the details of the different levels of the opera programs but you should ask about that at the audition.
It is possible to get a double degree at BU (BM from CFA and BA or BS from the College of Arts and Sciences). Like most double degree programs, it takes 5 years as it is 2 degrees, not 2 majors within one degree. A student can apply to the double degree program as an incoming freshman or can apply later. My daughter did not go in as a double degree student but is planning to do a double degree or at least a minor outside of music. The BM curriculum is pretty intense, however, so it requires a lot of planning and time management to do a double degree.
Good luck to your son with his audition! My daughter is very happy at BU and feels it’s a great match for her! Feel free to PM me if you have more questions.</p>