Sorry I don’t understand your post. Composition is a very competitive field. Were you thinking that applying for composition would be a way to avoid an instrumental audition? What change in rules were you referring to?
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USC Thornton is one school that does not require BM composition majors to submit a performance prescreen or audition. But they don’t take many students and they tend to be very difficult to get accepted at.
You can find others by checking their application requirements, which are almost always online.
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Friend with comp major applicant this year and the only school that required an audition on an instrument was Eastman. Student is applying to all the ones we talk about here- Juilliard, Curtis, Oberlin, USC, UCLA.
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Congratulations on being done for now and thanks for the good wishes! Just one more audition to go for us here now…
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That’s great! Three years ago, Oberlin and ucla required one.
Rooting for you and yours!!
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My son applied to NYU Steinhardt composition program. They didn’t ask for an audition, they have invitational interviews
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Interesting that NYU Steinhardt now has “concert composition” and film-scoring degree programs. I would be curious which has more applicants these days.
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My Son applied for the film scoring one, maybe that is why he didn’t have the audition and had only interview not sure about the applicants rate. He had some that required the audition and some that didn’t. Peabody “new media” program didn’t have the audition either but Berklee did. It was a mix of both.
My daughter applied as comp major at Jacobs (Indiana) and they required an extensive prescreening video on primary instrument (same as performance major) and an in person audition on her instrument. U. Mich also required full prescreening video but I don’t believe the in-person audition. Blair and Northwestern Bienen only require submission of one piece of your choice showing proficiency/musicianship on the primary instrument as part of prescreening. Definitely varies a lot!
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My kid is almost done a doctorate in composition and hasn’t touched an instrument for years. I cannot understand why any composition degree program requires an instrumental audition, unless they need players for orchestra or ensembles, which is doubtful in some of these schools.
Some film scoring programs don’t use live musicians at all, so it is understandable if they don’t have an instrumental audition.
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No, not to avoid audition. Composition is where talent lies. When his composition professor studied, no one was required to audition if composition was the major. (long ago)
This is EXACTLY what his teacher said 
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I wonder if some of it is “tradition” at schools and/or a weeding process.
Over 10 years ago when D auditioned for MT (along with VP), only one school had a pre-screen for MT. Now it appears most schools require a pre-screen. She only applied to 5 schools for MT (and got 3 acceptances). At that time, I guess that they suggested 10 - 12 schools to guarantee an acceptance…now I think it’s over 20 schools! Yikes. As the number of applicants go up…in some cases, you see new barriers to jump over…imho.
The VP auditions, however, seem similar to a decade ago with numbers and pre-screens. I guess being in opera doesn’t seem to carry the same cache as Broadway…plus all those silly languages…it keeps the riff-raff out.
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Prescreens are a different issue than instrumental auditions for composers. The latter isn’t even relevant to composing. You do not need to play an instrument to compose. Composition is usually prescreened with scores and recordings.
I feel like he (or we!) did things in wrong order and just hope things work out. 
@BadgerPam If I remember right, Jacob had two ways of applying in 2020 you either required prescreening with primary instrument or you did not. Of course they prefer the prescreening We picked the second , and my son was accepted.
We know one composer who is a voice major. I wonder if they required prescreening from him? U. Mich and OSU were very detailed they wanted full scales , arpeggios and more… My Kid did not apply to those.
I guess it changes with schools, and @compmom is right Composition should be prescreened with scored and recordings.
Our experience (three years ago) was both: prescreened for composition with scores and recordings as well as performance prescreening for some schools. I’m glad things seem to be changing !
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If prescreening was done for voice majors, then that person who also composes would have prescreening. It sounds like the composing was on the side and not a formal major or minor. IN that case the person would not even have to submit scores and recordings.
My daughter applied to 8 BM programs for composition. Of those, 2 required a full instrumental audition with her composition portfolio, 2 required a video of a piece of her choosing along with her portfolio, 3 didn’t ask for anything beyond the portfolio. And the last, Jacobs, asked for a full audition if you planned to study your instrument at the 400 level, and no audition if you wanted to study at the 100 level. That was a tough choice for her, but she went with the 100 level because she wants to really focus on composition. Totally a mixed bag and hard to keep track!
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