For classical musicians – all musicians, really – worried about recordings, this is an awesome and extremely useful article from Nathan Cole, First Assistant Concertmaster of the Los Angeles Philharmonic: https://www.natesviolin.com/make-audition-video-without-spending-fortune/
parentologist——My son wasn’t 100% sure which music to pursue in college and beyond until “almost” 11th grade. He was in both local “by-annually-audition” youth symphony orchestra and youth jazz ensembles in 10th grade and 11th grade. Jazz ensemble he was in from 10th to 12th grade is very prestigious and required traveling nationally and / or internationally during school time. Plus, high school symphonic band and jazz band from 7th to 12th grade. I know exactly how schedules, especially weekends are hectic. He needed to choose one music direction due to so many schedule conflicts (maxed out absence policies, etc) and it wasn’t that simple but he chose Jazz. Not all jazz musicians have enough classical music trainings. So, it was helpful for him to spend about 5 hours every Sunday for youth orchestra. But at some point, he figured out that jazz is what his heart is.
Depending on your child’s instrument (or voice?), he may need to choose one sooner or later. Probably, sooner is better to get prepared for college auditions. He can still take private lessons to continue both music but probably not equally. My son’s private teacher since 6th grade taught him both classical and jazz but my son actually took classical training occasionally from a local well known classical musician to be better at jazz playing. Honestly, we think that to survive as a musician, he has to be able to play all kinds of music in all kinds of setting. Hope, he can continue studying classical playing at some degree at conservatory he is attending from August.
Music school live auditions can be weekdays or weekends. My son had 2 weekend auditions and 2 weekday auditions. 3 needed to travel to another side of coast. It worked fine with one Early Action school live audition done in fall semester but with focusing only jazz. If my son continued classical as well and decided to apply to both jazz and classical programs at some conservatories (many elite conservatories don’t allow students to study both music), he would had so many repertoire to deals and longer preparation time, perhaps, he would ended up taking a gap year. I would have been OK with it though. But he is very happy with what he is doing and going to do.
Parentologist - I will concur with JeJeJe - our daughter was a classical bassist - and then fell in love with jazz. She moved to an area with a good jazz program and not as good classical - but at the same time, her shoulder was killing her from playing so much - so she dropped classical. That was in the middle of her junior year. She just couldn’t do both. But as JeJeJe points out - a classical background is invaluable in Jazz (and I would think vice versa). It is difficult to do both - I do know of one bassist who managed to do both but I think that’s the exception rather than the rule.
I saw this article on a Loyola New Orleans parent page and thought I’d share for those of us going through the “drop off” for the first time. We all have a “vision” of how it will go but that might not match the reality. I’m just trying to be prepared for anything. We leave August 10th for the long road trip to Loyola and her move-in day is August 13th. We get to stay for a 2 day orientation, then it’s the dreaded “goodbye” time ?
Aww love that @AmyIzzy. This will be my final “first dropoff” and I can attest to how different they were. One at a giant university with nine (!) suitemates and endless waiting - for elevators, for room keys, for IDs…this one at a tiny music school with only 120 freshmen total. One with air conditioning, two without (pray for a cool day). One daughter with truckloads of dorm decor, two sons with the minimum of “tschotchkes” and the maximum technology. And this youngest with two saxophones, a melodica, recording equipment, stand, suits and a tux (!) — to say nothing of winter clothes for the arctic — added to the mix.
Hang on tight, moms and dads! This long roller coaster ride is about to take another turn. Hug them hard, even if they’re feisty. And high-five a job well done.
Funny you should mention the ‘pray for cool day’ @akapiratequeen…at Temple orientation the head of housing said “It will either be 90 degrees or raining on move-in day and we will have tents set up for either scenario”. 
Thanks so much to everyone for these incredibly helpful responses! We are about to send our oldest off to school to study Musical Theatre and are gearing up for a year full of auditions for our youngest, who is a jazz drummer. Can’t believe we’re doing this AGAIN. @WestOfPCH - so glad to see another parent of a jazz drummer on here! Do you have any sense of how much (if at all) academics matter in various programs? Our son currently has a list that’s way too long and if you wouldn’t mind, I’d love to ask your impressions about a few different programs. Could I pm you? Tks again all!
Happy Monday, @212121. Happy to help in any way I can, especially when it comes to our general knowledge about the process and specific experiences related to the schools we considered initially, how my son whittled his list down, and how the specific auditions went.
To answer your question about how much academics matter at various programs:
- If it’s a conservatory unattached to a university, academics matter very little.
- if it’s a conservatory or music school/department within a larger university, academics definitely matter. The amount they matter tends to vary depending on the university
Generally speaking, the more prestigious the university, the less likely they are going to cut students any slack academically. The top universities require their music majors to have academics comparable (i.e. close to the mean/median GPA and SAT/ACT scores) to their general student population. This includes USC Thornton, NYU Steinhardt, Miami Frost, Northwestern Bienen to name the ones on my son’s list. My son had a solid GPA and ACT scores on top of tons of 5s and 4s on APs, so he was “in the ballpark” (i.e. at or above median GPA and ACT scores) for all of the schools.
There are some noteworthy exceptions – Peabody Conservatory at Johns Hopkins University is perhaps the biggest – where the expected GPA and SAT/ACT score for incoming freshmen music majors are not the same as the rest of the university. Peabody/JHU specifically say on their website: “For undergraduate applicants, we look for a 3.0 GPA and for SAT/ACT scores appropriate for success at a music conservatory. These are not the same as those used for entrance to other schools of the Johns Hopkins University. . . . In practice, we rarely reject anyone for purely academic reasons. However, it would not be ethical for us to accept a student who is unlikely to do well in the academic side of their programs.”
I’ve also heard that some of the state schools (U of Michigan, Eastman) might be a little more flexible with academics, but students still have to have reasonably competitive scores. That said, check with parents of students at those schools for better info.
Feel free to DM me about more specific questions. Very happy to help however I can.
@WestOfPCH - only just seeing this response (I have not been on CC for a while, and am catching up). Belated thanks for your helpful answers. You’ll probably see I also send you a DM with more specifics. Really appreciate your wisdom!
I haven’t posted here for a while, but I wanted to update some information I learned about deferment at Berklee that we learned last spring. My son applied to Berklee last fall and was accepted. He received scholarship money for his audition ($22K) and financial aid (3K grant and 5500 unsubsidized loan). We still could not afford the difference and asked to defer his admittance with the idea that he would reaudition this school year and try for more scholarship money. At first they said this was fine. But then we received a second correspondence (in May, I think) from Berklee that said, though they still allow us to defer admittance, if he wants to try for more scholarship money he needs to completely reapply. So, Berklee has changed it’s policy on this. You can no longer reaudition for more scholarship money without completely reapplying. I don’t spend any time on the 2024 thread, but if you do, you may want to pass this information on.
@khill87 , in regard to your post #4603, these are concerns most students/parents have during the audution process and there is no black and white correct response. I am linking very helpful previous discussions on trial lessons debate and another link on “hindsight-what would you have done differently and what have you done right” covering quantities and type of school application numbers. I hope they help.