<p>As far as the number of auditions for instrumentalists, I would recommend between 6-8. S started off with 9 on his list, did 2 early action / rolling admission so that he could add or subtract once the winter came. Remember, even though the application has been sent, you can withdraw your application and cancel the audition if you change your mind. After acceptance to the first school, he withdrew from his bottom choice. </p>
<p>After getting 2 early acceptances (no financial offer from Hartt until March) and finding himself totally overwhelmed in the 2nd week of January at the prospect of 6 more auditions, he canceled 1 and immediately felt a sense of relief. The next one was only an hour drive away, semi-safety, no pressure. That left 2 road trips since we were able to combine the others in to 2 long weekends, one a Friday (travel on Thursday) / Monday trip with enough travel time between to get from Rochester to Baltimore, and the final trip to Boston where the auditions were Friday and Saturday. One of those schools was a total stretch but S decided to go for it anyway since he would be there already. He probably could have done one more weekend, but don’t forget to add the emotional stress on an 18 year old in addition to all the other factors. So the final number of auditions for S was 7.</p>
<p>As it worked out, we were soooo lucky with the weather, winter thaw in Rochester with the kids walking around in t-shirts. Decent weather 2 weeks later in Boston also. We had heard of horrific weather the year before in Baltimore so we made sure that we added in extra travel time into our itinerary. </p>
<p>For Vocalists, I am not sure how realistic it is to plan back to back auditions, this must be very taxing on the voice. A string student can perform with a cold or other ailments (S jammed his 3rd finger playing football the week of his Eastman audition, his finger was totally purple and swollen ;p) but that becomes more difficult with wind / brass students and near impossible for vocalists.
You may have to rearrange or cancel at the last minute due to illness. Have that back-up CD ready just in case you cannot reschedule.</p>
<p>For performance, almost none of the schools are true safety, it all depends on the audition, and if you are sick on that audition day, the safety component may disappear.</p>
<p>I used a big paper calendar and wrote all possibilities in pencil and circled the first choice dates. It all eventually fell into place. Schools may be more accommodating if you call and tell them that you are traveling a great distance. Get your applications in as early as possible to give you a better chance at your first choice of date.</p>
<p>There are many factors which make the optimal number of applications/auditions different for each student:
a) Some students do not find the audition stressful. Some genuinely enjoy every minute of it and come away energized. Others become extremely nervous days before an audition and are completely drained after its completion.
b) Students who live within a couple of hours of several schools with which they are already familiar will not expend as much time, money, or psychological energy in auditioning at those close schools.<br>
c) Some students are interested in a few schools that have pre-Christmas auditions and results.
d) Many of the better schools require prescreening recordings. Once a student gets their results from these schools, they can shorten their lists. If you don’t make any of the prescreens, then you don’t have to do those live auditions! If you make all of your prescreens to Juilliard, NEC, Colburn . . ., then you can probably drop Podunk State U because you will probably make some of your mid-level schools.
e) Some instruments have less predictable or reliable audition results. For example, while both violin and voice are competitive, I think that there is probably much more widespread agreement amongst violin instructors as to who has competence/potential than there is amongst voice teachers. Vocalists may be wise to include a couple of more schools than violinists, if they want the same amount of choice after results are in.
f) Some instruments are just much more competitive in terms of the ratio of openings to applicants. Yes, sopranos and flautists probably have it the worst here. Students need to know not only how appropriate their ability level is for a school, but also how many openings the school has that year. In an ideal world, applicants would also know who else is out there that is applying in their year, but even with attendance at a variety of high level camps, you just never know about those three prodigies from Korea that are your age.
g) The best schools are crap shoots for almost all of their applicants. Only those who have an established performing career can be fairly certain of admission to the best schools. Hence, students who are in this ballpark (not those who are in the impossible dream state), may need to have slightly longer lists.
h) Some students’ audition schedules allow for two auditions in a single trip.</p>
<p>My bottom line is that we should not criticize anyone that chooses to apply to a dozen schools. Students who have applied to a dozen schools should, however, heed the warnings here about auditioning at a dozen schools. For most students, about six auditions is probably the maximum that is advisable, but every situation and student is different.</p>
<p>Ultimately, at most live auditions a student will rarely perform for longer than about 10 minutes. Most live auditions are about 15 minutes in length with some of that time taken up by walking in and out, introductions, some conversation for faculty to get to know the student, tuning, piano introductions/interludes etc… While obviously there is warm-up time and rehearsal time with one’s accompanist, an audition is not taxing in terms of the amount of singing or playing required. If it is, then the performer needs to consider whether their repertoire is healthy for them. What is difficult is all the angst, sturm und drang associated with a performance and the travel and time away from one’s normal routine. These factors vary considerably from person to person.</p>
<p>Thank you, Violindad. We are fully aware of the difficulties inherent in auditioning at 12 schools. We are indeed in the NE, which brings the advantages of proximity with the disadvantages of weather. And D has decided that she would prefer to do a gap year than to go to a mediocre school. And she doesn’t in fact have to do 12 auditions should she be fortunate enough to be offered all 12. So a longer list for us it is.</p>
<p>I want to add to my previous post that if your instrument or voice requires pre-screening then that should be taken into account when making the decision of the number of schools to which you apply. You may want to add a few to the list up front. Best case scenario, you are invited to audition at all of the schools and will then have to decide how many auditions you will actually attend. </p>
<p>Violindad makes some very good points regarding some of the factors influencing how many schools to have on your list. Another is that finances may also be a factor in adding to or limiting the number of schools. Each musician has a unique situation.</p>
<p>For many at this stage of the game the list will still be evolving and it may look very different in another month or two. Good Luck to all.</p>
<p>Look for some programs, be they safeties or otherwise, that hold auditions on the early side. The usual audition season is about from January through March, but there are some schools that hold auditions October through December that could give you decisions on the early side. There are several benefits to this approach - you spread out the auditions a bit so that the beginning of the calendar year is not quite as hectic, it can be very nice knowing that you have an acceptance (should you get one) in your back pocket at later auditions and, if you do not get any early acceptances, you still have a bit of time to focus on your safeties. If you do happen to get an early acceptance to one of the schools higher up on your list, you can withdraw applications from some of the lower ones and really concentrate on your two or three top choices.</p>
<p>Be careful about thinking of Rutgers as a safety for flute. Bart Feller attracts applications from lots of very good students, including some of the ones he works with at the Juilliard pre-college program. Mason Gross does not have the same name recognition factor as many of the schools on your list, but Feller could make it a very attractive destination for flute players, particularly with the cost of attendance running 25% less (out of state) to 50% less (NJ students) than the list price of many of those better-known places, financial aid of various types notwithstanding.</p>
<p>I know Rowan has an early audition date in December and you would get the result in January and so potentially have a “safety” in your pocket. Don’t forget Montclair State if you are based in NJ. The Cali School of Music building just opened and in a couple of years I feel it will be very competitive to get in. William Patterson is another potential “safety” school for classical music in NJ. My son did 11 auditions and was accepted to eight schools but it was a long expensive process and meant he could not do any honor bands his senior year. Still he learnt a lot going through the proces and had individual lessons with some great teachers across the North East. He was not accepted at Temple but was at Indiana U so agree no school is a true “safety” as everything depends on a schools needs in a particular year.</p>
<p>When an audition is involved no situation is a sure thing. Bad auditions happen, bad chemistry, subjective opinions, lack of openings, etc. Even Podunk U can not be taken for granted. </p>
<p>The points made about early auditions and learning from pre-screening results are good ones. If you get no’s from 8 of 8 prescreenings you might be overestimating your level. If you get yes from 8 of 8 you probably will get into one of them.</p>
<p>Something to be said about having one in your pocket in December.</p>
<p>The other thing to consider is the applicants who are also doing an audition. The reality is that YOUR audition might be excellent…but if the school has only 2 openings on your instrument (includes voice), and two folks are outstanding…you will not get accepted.</p>
<p>Right…the year my son was accepted to undergrad, the school accepted TWELVE trumpet players and they ALL accepted enrollment. Needless to say…there were way too many trumpets in the studio. The following year, they accepted NO trumpet students into the studio.</p>
<p>DS did a great audition to one school undergrad (he thought so…and he also got a letter from the trumpet faculty telling him so)…but the school only had ONE opening for a trumpet performance major and someone else got that spot.</p>
<p>Flutes and sopranos are very subject to this issue. Simply put, there are way more of them applying than there are spots in the studios.</p>
<p>I have asked a college administrator about the acceptance issue. How many do you offer and how many accept. As you say when they expect half or 2/3 to accept and suddenly the have 12 instead of the 6 they predicted based on historic results there is a problem.</p>
<p>Many years there are no openings at all for instruments like the flute and normally they will not let you know that. They will still audition even if they have no intention of taking anyone. </p>
<p>The attrition rate is high at many schools too. Kids getting out of performance or transfering to another school. That can be a big factor.</p>
<p>Ah yes all the variables that make this process so complicated.</p>
<p>For less common instruments I have found the professors very open on how many open slots they will have the next year. Each professor has a fixed number of pupils to teach in their contract and know how many openings they will have based upon graduations and transfers. The admissions office will probably never say exactly how many kids they will accept to get to that yield so that is the fun bit.</p>
<p>Unless things have changed in the last year, Westchester in PA has an audition date in November and they let you know the decision before you leave that day. Based on scores, the top people are offered performance, the next group is offered music ed, if that is a choice they are interested in, and the next group is offered a BA in Music with the opportunity to audition again in the fall. There are theory and sight reading tests that must also be passed for admission - they are not for placement only.</p>
<p>It’s not unusual for the bar to be set higher for performance majors than for music ed so they are just up front about it. Kids interested in music ed have to interview and express interest up front and since some of them express interest in both performance and music ed, they tell them in the exit interview if they get to choose or if only music ed is offered. For those that only chose music ed, there would be no reason to tell them whether they scored high enough for performance or not. For those who don’t score high enough for either, I was told by others that they discuss what needs to be done to make it.</p>
<p>We just went throught this process last year with our d. I will offer what we found to be helpful.
We found out that connections were very important. Be it an instructor from a summer program or one that saw her perform in orchestras or masterclasses. When the acceptances and rejections came in, it was obvious that connections were a definate help.<br>
Once d visited the schools, she completely changed her mind where she wanted to go. Her list was around 9 schools…conservatories and major universities. At the end, she wanted a small studio at a large school. Make sure you check the size of the studio and the opportunities to play. It was important to D to be able to play in a band or orchestra.
I really wonder if there are any real safety schools. Several of d’s friends as well as herself were accepted to top programs and not into what they considered their safety school!! D’s safety schools were the ones that approached her, but even at that she still had to audition and apply! She did some early auditions and when acceptances came in, those were her safety! ;D Since you are in New Jersey I would look into West Chester. I would not call this a safety, but it was not on your list. D loved the teacher there and the facilities were beautiful. Not sure if I would list Temple as a safety. Same with Rutgers…do not know too much about Rowan.<br>
Check for audition requirements! We found that some schools required a live on campus audition. Also many of the schools require a pre screening. Make sure your prescreening is a good quality!! When d made her final list and applied, we called to verify all audition requirements. It was then we found out some required or “highly reccomended” a live audition for flute. Also see if there are any openings in the flute studio. Some still hold auditions even if the studio is full.<br>
I wish you the best! If I could help in any way, please feel free to ask…</p>
<p>Agree about the facilities at West Chester, and the campus and town are lovely. notfromme, can you tell me when their(WC’s) marching band first permitted women to join? Believe it or not, back in the early 70’s, girls were not allowed to march with the group even if they held first chair positions in the orchestra! Just one of those things I’ve wondered about…</p>