<p>Indiana U, prescreen</p>
<p>Oklahoma U, prescreen</p>
<p>Coastal Carolina</p>
<p>Texas State U, prescreen</p>
<p>James Madison</p>
<p>University of Cincinnati, prescreen (voice program)</p>
<p>Shenandoah Conservatory</p>
<p>University of Michigan, prescreen</p>
<p>Otterbein U, prescreen</p>
<p>Tisch/NYU</p>
<p>Illinois Weslyan</p>
<p>Stevens Point</p>
<p>add NYU Steinhardt MT, prescreen (not new this year but not yet on the list):</p>
<p>[Music</a> Theatre Auditions - Music Theatre - NYU Steinhardt](<a href=“http://steinhardt.nyu.edu/music/theatre/auditions#01]Music”>http://steinhardt.nyu.edu/music/theatre/auditions#01)</p>
<p>U of michigan is very informative in describing their requirements on this wave of the future.</p>
<p>[UM</a> School of Music, Theatre & Dance - Department of Musical Theatre - Auditions & Interviews](<a href=“http://www.music.umich.edu/departments/mustheatre/auditions.htm]UM”>http://www.music.umich.edu/departments/mustheatre/auditions.htm)</p>
<p>no DVD necessary. you simply upload your videos to their site. it is just like uploading to youtube. </p>
<p>fire up the camcorders, people.</p>
<p>Wow!!! All those who have the ability to invest… I see a future in good (not expensive) recording businesses…</p>
<p>My concern with this pre-screening of auditions via internet or DVD is that all of this can be edited to be perfect (or near perfect so that it doesn’t look like it was edited) which means that, once again, those with more money and better access to better facilities have an advantage over those who do not. Oh and don’t forget the accompanist who might charge. That plus the cost of coaches makes just auditioning for colleges extremely expensive, not to mention SAT/ACT coaching should that be something a student uses. That doesn’t even account for traveling to the Unifieds or individual schools. It’s out of control IMHO.</p>
<p>Interesting article in NYT
<a href=“Hopefuls Sing Out From Afar as Broadway Scouts Go Online - The New York Times”>Hopefuls Sing Out From Afar as Broadway Scouts Go Online - The New York Times;
<p>Wow, sjstxmom, that was an eye opening article. The point being it makes sense to get used to this new way of doing things. Happily, however, the purpose of the college prescreening videos are to weed out students who are not prepared, not to select a final class. (Wouldn’t it be great if the weeding out process allowed the actual individual MT audition to be slightly longer?)</p>
<p>AMTC- I noticed on the UMich website it says that the videos are to be unedited. That tells me that if you sing a cut, you need to perform the cut like at a live audition; if you sing 8 bars from the beginning and the last 8 bars at the end, then sing all 16 bars together; don’t piece the 8 bar clips together later. </p>
<p>I don’t know the answer to this, but would a school with the resources of a UMich have someone on staff with the ability to recognize if a song had been professionally edited, especially in regards to intonation and quality of sound? </p>
<p>Of course, if someone managed to present a good video only because he/she used a professional video and sound team who did a lot of editing like they do for pop singers who actually can’t sing, and somehow the video got past the “editing police,” this person would still fail dramatically at the required live audition later. So save your money if your child with average or less ability begs for a professional prescreen video- it won’t help in the end.</p>
<p>D found that at YoungArts, which is adjudicated solely on DVD submissions, the vast majority of finalists came from performing arts schools that had professional video facilities onsite. That may have been partially because those kids also had access to the best training, but she wondered if the video quality mattered. Her video was a hot mess from a technical standpoint, though, so perhaps it doesn’t matter. </p>
<p>One thing of note – most kids from YoungArts found that using a recording of their accompanist, rather than a live accompaniment, worked much better for recording a DVD as it was easier to get the right volume balance in the rooms where they were recording.</p>
<p>Assuming videos aren’t auto-tuned, and the piano doesn’t drown out the singer, I’d guess that adjudicators can tell a lot from a video.</p>
<p>This is just some information I would like to share about our DVD experience. We have made 4 recorded DVD’s for summer programmes and for college auditions. It is much better to have recorded music rather than a live accompaniment. It was very difficult to get a good mix between the piano and the singing with the live pianist. When we were putting together the DVD’s for college auditions (1 pre-screen and 1 audition) it was very time consuming to make sure that each college requirement was met for each DVD. For example 1 monologue time requirement was shorter than the other - so we did 2 recordings of one of the monolgoues; one 45 seconds and one 60 seconds. We could have just used a 45 second cut for both but the 60 second cut was better/more complete so we decided to record both a 45 and 60 second cut.
The 32 bars of music were the same for both schools fortunately - but many schools only want 16 bars - so that is another issue to be concerned with - making sure you have the right bars of music on the right DVD for the right school. Making sure the monologues are within requested time requirements and making sure that you are within required overall audition time limits for each school. I could see that if you were making a number of recordings for different schools with differrent requirements that this could be a very time consuming process. We were able to do takes of each song and each monologue then put them together to match the requirements for each school. In other words we did not have to film the song and monologue requirements for each individual school while filming without a break (is this what they mean by unedited?).
Plan for these recordings to take longer than you think!</p>
<p>“In other words we did not have to film the song and monologue requirements for each individual school while filming without a break (is this what they mean by unedited?).”</p>
<p>Wow if I were auditioning for UMich I’d certainly ask them what exactly they mean by “unedited.”</p>
<p>I do not speak for anyone, but I can tell you that some schools want to see the transition from piece to piece. Therefore, they do not want to see edited videos. However, I suspect what is truly meant by “unedited” is the use of video and audio tricks to make the student sound/look better. With the technology available, I can make anyone look and sound rather good with a little time, a decent computer and some relatively inexpensive software.</p>
<p>kjgc- that’s a frightening thought. Since you know how to do the “tricks,” can you recognize when a student’s video has such tricks in place, improving sound, etc?</p>
<p>An old boss of mine is the inventor of Auto-tune, Andy Hildebrand. Here is a quote from Andy:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Here is a link to an interesting interview with Andy regarding use and abuse of Auto-tune that was done for the PBS series NOVA:</p>
<p>[NOVA</a> | Auto-Tune: Expert Q&A](<a href=“http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/tech/hildebrand-auto-tune.html]NOVA”>Auto-Tune: Expert Q&A | NOVA | PBS)</p>
<p>I guess that colleges are going to have to come up with tests for “performance-enhancing software.” This would actually not be very hard software to write, especially if you already had the algorithms for something like Auto-tune.</p>
<p>Hmmm… I’d never heard of Auto Tune before! I can only imagine how ****ed the auditors would be if someone did this, got a an audition through the pre-screen and then clearly didn’t exhibit the same level of performance in the live audition. You can’t “auto-tune” yourself in a live audition. But you can certainly waste people’s time if you had auto-tuned your pre-screen dvd. I would hope people will exhibit ethical behavior when it comes to dvd pre-screening.</p>
<p>@stagedoor22 - Auto-tune is the “Photoshop” of the music recording industry. Just like all those magazine covers don’t really represent what the starlets actually look like, many (some say all) recording artists today get “help” from Auto-tune. Some get only a little “help,” some (like Britney Spears, apparently) get a lot of help.</p>
<p>I think that “auto-tune” is VERY noticeable…(Glee, for example!!) Furthermore, I don’t think that this is anything to worry about. This is a student auditioning for a college program. If a school accepts a student that has obviously “edited” a video, then why would anybody else even WANT to waste their time and go there. I think that schools should, can, and will be able to tell if a video is edited; and even if they can’t, once a student gets past the pre-screen and they audition live, nothing will be able to be “edited.” It’s nothing to worry about. Make your pre-screen video. Show who YOU truly are. If a school wants you, then good. If a school says no, then why would you still WANT to go there. It’s not the right fit for you. Also, if someone does “edit” their video and they somehow make it in, that’s their own problem. The ultimate goal is a career in MT, not a career in college auditions. They won’t be able to cheat the system for that long. It’s their own problem, and they will be going to a school that didn’t pick up on that. That sounds like a perfect fit to me! A cheating student and a school that can’t detect cheaters.</p>
<p>Agreed. I would not worry about those who “cheat” on a pre-screen video. They still have to audition live and so the auditors will be able to hear the real thing then. </p>
<p>I agree that auto-tune is prevalent in the music industry. But not all artists use it. My daughter has her first CD coming out this month of her original songs and I just saw the liner notes and see that on it she has printed: “No pitch correction was used in making this recording.” I have noticed a similar type statement on some music videos she has performed on as well that are online. I know she does NOT use auto-tune. I assume the reason to state this on what she publishes is because it is something that many others do use and she wants to be clear she has not used such devices.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Don’t you watch Glee? ;)</p>
<p>Good for your daughter, Susan. The difference with her is that she doesn’t NEED autotune. She’s got talent!</p>
<p>AlwaysAMom, you are very sweet. I just mentioned it because another post implied that perhaps all recording artists use Auto-Tune, and I know my daughter has not, and my main point was that since it is used widely, that artists like her who don’t use such enhancements to alter their recordings or videos may opt to clearly state on anything that is published that such devices have not been used. I assume that’s why she has done so on her CD and on some music videos, but I haven’t asked her. It just so happens she sent me the digital liner notes as the CDs are being printed and it came to my mind when reading some posts here about auto-tune.</p>