Chicago Unifieds Audition Scheduling Advice and Best Practices

My daughter did 3 walk-ins for schools that she was already interested in but hadn’t applied because she already had 2 per day scheduled. Once she found she had room in her schedule, she decided to audition for those 3 schools. All 3 had audition requirements very similar to her other scheduled auditions. None of them had an accompanist, but most of her scheduled auditions didn’t either. One of the walk-in schools had a dance audition; one had a call-back interview and one just the audition (but she was the last one of the day and they spent 45 minutes with her!)

Our D did 8 auditions (MT and straight acting) at Chicago Unifieds. We arrived on Sunday morning and stayed through Wednesday evening. We stayed on a regular floor in the Palmer House. We booked parking ahead via SpotHero. A few of the auditions were off property but not even a mile away. It was all very manageable. My advice would be to consider doing all or some of the schools that have dance calls on-campus, if possible. For instance, Texas State, University of Michigan, Pace, and CCM. These schools chew up a lot of valuable time with long, involved auditions. As I recall, Carnegie’s audition takes a lot of time too but not for a dance call. Our D did Moonifieds, Chicago Unifieds and just one on-campus audition. It worked out well for her. But, if you are planning to go to some on-campus auditions, then I would make it a priority to go to at least some of the schools that require you to set aside an entire morning or afternoon to get through the audition process. I think it’s a better use of time overall. Leave Unifieds open for lots of shorter auditions, if possible. A few audition essentials – two of the same dress, just in case; a bose soundlink mini II and aux cord; a small humidifier for the room, and a binder with all the sheet music for an accompanist in case one is provided.

@owensfolks - yes, walk-ins will have a signup sheet and they are first-come, first served. In our experience, most schools that held walk-ins did not specify such on their website, they just listed that they would be there and you had to call them to ask how to sign up to audition at Unifieds. Some walk-ins do not even note their appearance at Unifieds on their website, they just show up, put up a poster in one or more of the audition floor lobbies in the Palmer house, and post a sign-up sheet outside the door to their room. If you are interested in doing walk-ins, its a good idea to patrol each of the audition floor lobbies early in the morning and then again a little later in the day to see who has put up a notice about walk-ins (or left some flyers out on the tables announcing walk-in auditions). They tend to fill up pretty fast. Some schools allow you to schedule auditions ahead of time and also have slots open at Unifieds for walk-ins if they don’t fill up.

Some walk-ins have an accompanist, but I think most do not.

As others have noted, some walk-ins do have a dance call, some only offer the dance call as part of a callback process (if you don’t get called back for the dance, you are not going to get an offer). Some walk-ins have a callback late in the afternoon for an interview.

Some schools who fill up before Unifieds end up with open slots due to no-shows. If you are REALLY interested in a school but didn’t get an audition slot, it doesn’t hurt to go by their table and ask if they have any open slots.