<p>Just a note (sorry for the pun)…just because a student takes a practice lesson and it goes well…does NOT mean the student will be accepted to a program. If the lesson does NOT go well, it will not mean necessarily that the student will be rejected. MOST program acceptances are based on the audition…period. DS had some terrific (got good feedback) sample lessons at places where he was not accepted (for grad school). OTOH, one of his acceptances undergrad came at a place where the person he had his lesson with was NOT on the committee hearing the audition. </p>
<p>The practice lesson, for my kid, was to see how he meshed with the faculty. To be honest, he really LIKED all the teachers with whom he took lessons. BUT I will tell you that a lot of research went into that list. He spoke to his teacher at the time, friends who played the same instrument, students a year or two older, friends who are professional musicians, and his youth orchestra conductor. Not surprisingly, several names were mentioned over and over and over again. In the end, he did his undergrad degree studying with one of those frequently mentioned teachers…and it was fabulous. </p>
<p>I would advise anyone “looking” for a practice lesson to research the options FIRST. I don’t think the practice lesson should be the only way one “teacher shops”…if you know what I mean. </p>
<p>And as others have stated, find out the schools’ policies on assigning studios. They vary.</p>
<p>Some other thoughts on the value of practice lessons. For those among us parents who are not music mavins and start this process with little knowlege of the academic environment, multiple practice lessons can be an extremely helpful. At first I was very insecure in my decision to let my daughter go to music school. I had many concerns, not least of which was my own inability to gage her talent. We all know that music, particularly for sopranos, is an extremely competitive field. However, the process of going through multiple practice lessons and hearing the vast majority of professors providing positive feedback, is extremely re-assuring for both the student and the parent on the threshold of investing thousands of dollars in a music education. My daughter and I enjoyed every minute of every practice lesson; we learned a lot about people, schools, music, vocalizing and each other. After maybe 25 practice lessons, we see patterns in the feedback and things that my daughter will want to work on. We also met wonderful people among all the voice teachers we encountered – people who have a real love of music, of teaching, of the process of nurturing students. The whole process was extremely uplifting and if you have the opportunity, time (and the money) to have lots of practice lessons in lots of schools – go for it. I wouldn’t give up the experience for the world. And I believe my daughter would say the same thing. </p>
<p>By the way, as I’ve mentioned in previous postings, I would say that on average only one teacher per school charged for a lesson – and there was no pattern as to quality of teacher and charging policy. Both the best and the worst teachers charged.</p>
<p>Your daughter has taken 25 sample lessons with college teachers? Wow…that is a LOT. Like I said earlier…we did the research into the schools and teachers before any lessons were scheduled. Paying for (and I know that some don’t charge and others do) and traveling to 25 sample lessons seems very excessive to me. I’m not saying that what you gained was invaluable, but your daughter is NOT going to apply to study with even half of those teachers. Just seems like a lot to me.</p>
<p>25? That is unbelievable! I don’t even know how you had time, and how they didn’t all blur together! I agree with Thumper, that some “prescreening” of teachers can happen in advance of a potential visit. There is no way to visit all of the possible teachers. We also loved the visits and lessons but had a small fraction of that number of 25!</p>
<p>My kid only had 3. (And none at the school he ultimately attended.)</p>
<p>25 is one every other week for a year! I hope you started early. (Maybe voice is different. Are you meeting with multiple teachers at one school?)</p>
<p>It’s incredible that Allmusic and Thumper have a such strong opinions without knowing the facts. I wish I could be so sure of things. We started out with 10 schools that we looked at closely. We had a combination of private and state schools; schools that we knew gave scholarships and schools that we weren’t so sure about. Two were reach schools. Every school on our initial list had its own reason for being there. Through the visits and practice lessons, my daughter knocked off three of them for various reasons before she started applying. Once the admissions letters came in, along with the scholarships, we again had to cut the list down further and find exactly the right combination of teacher, school, geography, scholarship and so on. Also, through the practice lessons, we encountered many, many fine professors, but many of them were not right for my daughter. She knows what she’s doing and what works for her. Where she ultimately ended up – at WCC --, there were a number of prof’s who she would have enjoyed working with. Also, keep in mind that she is intending to double major in music education. So, she was interested in further qualifying schools’ departments in that area as well. We took 10 trips to schools and had 3 or four lessons per school – so it may have been more than 25 and you know what – I wouldn’t have eliminated a single one of them. And I know my daughter wouldn’t have either. </p>
<p>By the way, we did extensive research into each school; we carefully read the bio of every faculty member we visited, including the music education prof’s. We also attended studio classes, theory classes, music education classes, and diction classes. We learned a lot and came away a lot smarter from the experience. I understand that not everyone can afford this luxory, but we could and we did. I looked upon the entire process as an investment. And it worked for her. </p>
<p>I’m almost afraid to tell you that we ended up going to two of the schools three times to make sure the decision was right. The school that had been the front runner for a year, dropped to third place after the 2nd and third trip. The school in third place jumped to first place. And if I told you the first school we ever visited was the one she ended up selecting, you’d probably giggle.</p>
<p>I think she made the right choice. Sure it would have been a lot cheaper and considerably less time consuming had she just stuck with the first school – but now we know it was probably the best choice. And this time next year – I might be telling you something completely different but we did the best we could.</p>
<p>KeyofH…it sounds like this process worked for you and your daughter. That is all that mattered…and she has selected a school that she feels is good for her. You are right…it’s not something that everyone could afford to do. But clearly it was valuable to you.</p>
<p>And I was just expressing my opinion. I would also hate to think that folks reading this forum for advice think that 25 sample lessons is the norm during a college search. Thanks for clarifying that.</p>
<p>Thumper1 – here’s the other thing to think about. If a student travels to visit, let’s say, just three schools, it’s still possible to schedule multiple practice lessons at each school – as many as three or four. So that’s 12 practice lessons. I understand that depending on the school and the instrument, there may not even be that many faculty members. But for voice there are typically more than four faculty members – at least during the regular school year (not summer). My feeling was that if my daughter were going to travel to a school, she might as well as get as much as possible out of the trip. And for some people, you’re right – 25 sample lessons are not necessary. My daughter has a friend – also a very talented singer. She fell in love with Oberlin and the teachers there. After her trip to Oberlin she really wasn’t interested in looking any further. We enjoyed our trips; it was quality time we spent together. If other parent-musician teams have the opportunity to do the same, I would say go for it.</p>
<p>WCC has such a big faculty, you could do half that number of sample lessons there and still have plenty left. My D’s private voice teacher went to school with one of the teachers there so she just took one sample lesson there with that teacher. It would have been almost impossible otherwise to decide which teachers to choose there for sample lessons.</p>
<p>Sorry! I thought you visited 25 different schools for lessons. Had you done that, it was, of course, still your choice, but by no means the norm. </p>
<p>We were told at one very highly ranked conservatory (by another music faculty member, not my son’s instrument, who had a courtesy meeting with us since he was friends with S’s HS teacher) that having lessons with multiple faculty members was a no-no, at least on a single visit. Perhaps that isn’t true on other instruments, and perhaps it isn’t even true at other schools, but he only had a lesson with one teacher on his instruments, and that was always one who had been recommended to us by someone else (his teacher, an ensemble director, etc.). </p>
<p>Everyone’s mileage varies, but new parents on the forum should not think that most kids are going back for multiple lessons, or doing even a large fraction of 25 lessons. I don’t think they are.</p>
<p>25 schools! I don’t think that even I could shoot for that objective. It makes me tired and poorer just thinking about it!</p>
<p>As for as no-no’s regarding multiple lessons – I haven’t heard of that. And it gets my back up a little also. The way I look at it and I think, as consummers of education, a lot of other people would want to look it, we are at the brink of committing $50K, $100K, sometimes as much as $300k for our child’s education. Most of us wouldn’t think of driving a car, buying a house, hiring a contractor site unseen or without evidencing their work or without comparison shopping. The selection of a voice teacher (and probably teachers of other instruments as well), I think, is a lot more subjective, and perhaps even more complex. So the idea of trying out a single professor per school seems odd to me, unless your child falls in love immediately with the first one and for all the right reasons. Committing to a school without a practice lesson seems very strange. </p>
<p>Also keep in mind what another poster brought out – even if you find the right professor, not all schools honor that selection. You may need 2nd and 3rd choices. At my daughter’s former number one school, just before auditions, we heard that teacher choices 1 and 2 were leaving the school. Choices 4,5, and 6 were not acceptable to my daughter resulting in her selecting another school.</p>
<p>In fairness to Allmusic and Thumper, the only facts they had access to were what you gave - your own statement of having 25 lessons. The fact that you had multiple lessons at one school is the exception, not the rule, I think, so I don’t blame them for assuming that took a lot of visits. For many instruments, even if you had the opportunity to study with more than one teacher, the instrumentalist couldn’t handle more than perhaps two lessons in a single day. So that’s still a lot of time involved. I am glad you have come back to explain a bit more. I know next to nothing about voice. I can only screen others’ comments via my own experiences.</p>
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<p>Although I don’t necessarily recommend it, this is exactly what we did, and happens more often than you might think. We accepted the advice and recommendations of other teachers we trusted who felt that the teacher in question would be fantastic for our S. We lived overseas, and sample lessons weren’t available in the time we had.</p>
<p>What has been interesting to me is how many of my S’s classmates (he goes to Juilliard) got there without CC, without sample lessons, without many of the things we on CC feel are critical. (I found CC when S was auditioning - when I Googled for what to wear to an audition. The music board didn’t even exist back then.) We all want to do right by our children, but the reality is that there is no one-size-fits-all process. No method is “right”, no school is “perfect”, and no outcome is guaranteed. We all just have to do the best we can.</p>
<p>Wow! thanks for all the posts! My son plays the trumpet. He defininitely suffers with performance anxiety but has gotten a lot better. He did not realize he should take lessons and doesn’t have anything he feels is ready to show a potential college. He feels he would need months to prepare. He is looking at Northwestern - which he feels would be a BIG stretch musically for him to be accepted at. He will return in the winter for audition. Perhaps then he should schedule a lesson then when he feels he is more prepared or should we try to schedule one now with something that may not be all that polished? I just don’t want to push him to schedule a lesson and have it be a negative experience and hurt him rather than help him with the admissions process.</p>
<p>I don’t think a musician has to have something prepared for a lesson. My D didn’t. We had just moved back to the US, and she was starting fresh with a new teacher. She took the stuff she was working on - all still very rough - and the teachers understood. When she went back only two months later for her auditions, all the teachers were really impressed by what she’d accomplished in 2 months. I think it worked in her favor.</p>
<p>Several things might happen if your S took a lesson now:</p>
<ol>
<li> He could find out if he likes the teacher’s teaching style.<br></li>
<li> The teacher might be able to give feedback based upon tone, teachability, technique. The teacher could well end up saying, “This is not the right school for you.” That might be valuable info if you want to save some application and travel expenses. (Obviously, your S would still be allowed to apply if he thought the teacher was wrong.)</li>
<li> The teacher might give important info about the audition - Suggestions about how to play something, how to best prepare.</li>
</ol>
<p>I think I’d go for it. In the meantime, make sure your S is working hard on basics, like scales, “sound”, technique.</p>
<p>It’s not a recital…it’s a LESSON. Both of my kids were told to bring their practice etude books, and orchestral excerpts…and some sampling of part of a solo piece. Their practice lessons were LESSONS…the teachers listened to them and offered suggestions and strategies. The did not expect a perfected product.</p>
<p>Re:25 practice lessons…was this young lady also taking private lessons with a longterm respected teacher? Was she participating in multiple ensembles and solo opportunities?</p>
<p>There is another thread here about balancing things with music. I’m quite sure we would not have had the TIME (with our kids’ piano and other instrument lessons, ensemble performances, youth orchestra, music festivals, etc) to do 25 practice lessons. And I’m not sure either of their high school applied teachers would have encouraged that either…lots of differing opinions and lots of time.</p>
<p>Disclaimer…I’m not passing judgment on the OP…just stating what we would have experienced from our end. If it worked for them, then it was the right process for them.</p>
<p>Ha, ha. Brandon Eubank went to MAW with my kid. He should know better about Juilliard. These are the kind of comments that take on a life of their own. If Brandon didn’t go to Juilliard, why does he say things like that? Now someone on CC is going to post about a trumpet player they “know” who thinks Juilliard kids are cutthroat or something… Can’t speak to other studios, but the horn studio is definitely “family.” Anybody who attended the multiple memorial services for Jerome Ashby can attest to that.</p>
<p>Argh. Sorry to go off-topic. It was a very informative article otherwise.</p>
<p>I think what gets me about this whole conversation are those comments that imply that as a junior or senior in HS and looking at music colleges and conservatories the student doesn’t have pieces to play at a lesson. My kids are always building repetoire. Both of my kids seem to study 4 to six new pieces a year, some for recital performance some for competitions. In our state (NY) most musicians learn at least one piece for state exams. We have also encouraged our kids to find pieces that they want to learn for themselves. Their teachers have also been encouraging them to build repetoire resumes in anticipation of college. There is nothing wrong with meeting a college prof with two pieces in hand that they have been working on I mean they are learning, they are students.</p>
<p>Aside from the lessons we tried to meet the studio students and my son was invited on several occassions to join the master class as apart of a visit. Of course to do this you have to be prepared to spend some time at the school, often more than just a day.</p>
<p>As an example, my son will be attending Crane (SUNY Potsdam) next year (I know it’s not Julliard or a conservatory, no snickering, Crane is a damn fine and respected school) but after speaking with the prof to make arrangements for a lesson, he offerred us much more. We went up on a Tuesday and Tuesday evening my S joined the profs Master Class for 90 minutes (The group invited him to a jam sesion afterwards but after the 8 hour drive he was exhausted). Wednesday morning he attended a theory class and a second instrument tech class. Spent an hour with the prof behind closed doors. Was set up to play an hour of Duets with a junior. On Thursday he was invited to sit in for a 2 hour rehearsal with the Crane Wind Ensemble. To top it off, while he was with the Wind Ensemble, I spent 45 minutes with prof just talking about my son, his plans and the profs overall impressions of my son. This is of course a pretty over the top example (Crane actively recruited my son), I understand that but we pretty much were able to meet the class and spend some extra time at most of the schools we looked at.</p>
<p>I don’t expect to get the same treatment with my daughter (flute/piccolo) my son is low brass (the laid back fun folk in the back :-)) but I will try and I don’t think I will allow my daughter to commit to a school without knowing that she will be a good fit with her teacher and hopefully the studio itself. Of course YMMV.</p>
<p>Indeed, YMMV. DD was asked to play principal on her instrument for a performance at U of San Diego when she went to visit. They actually didn’t HAVE a teacher on her instrument, but the orchestra director listened to her and talked with her via email and on the phone…then she asked my kid to play for this performance and sent her the music. She is NOT a music major and their program is VERY small…and does include community members. </p>
<p>At one school, DS was invited to a full day of events after he was accepted. He sat in on the studio class, had a private lesson, had lunch with the music adcom, went to the orchestra rehearsal, and was invited to the brass jury.</p>
<p>At another school, the faculty offered to give him lessons AFTER his audition and he took them. He was invited to two of the Pittsburgh Symphony concerts (tickets given…and they even drove him to one). </p>
<p>One place didn’t even return his phone calls or emails regarding visiting for more than the 10 minute audition…but he got accepted there nonetheless.</p>
<p>Sagiter, my D (now finishing junior year) went through a period this year where pieces she would have felt comfortable taking to a potential college instructor were slim pickings. The “regionals” state piece was one she had played several years ago and not at a level she would have wanted to bring to a college, and the “all state” piece and her working rep were too rough to show to anyone who wasn’t already aware of her strengths and weaknesses. </p>
<p>Now she does have stuff ready, and of course now it’s summer, and there are no professors around to hear her play. ;-)</p>
<p>We might tour some campuses anyway (at least the local ones) and return in the fall for lessons once a few places get knocked off the list. I’m not sure we can handle 25, though!</p>
<p>Does the “only one lesson on a visit” rule apply when you’ve flown halfway across the country to visit a school and can’t just pop in to see other teachers?</p>