<p>Thats true; music is a college major among many college majors offered at most colleges, in all the tiers of colleges, and students may just want to spend 4 years doing it and then go on with their lives. On this forum, though, I think many continuing posters are looking for more specialized information that is not as readily accessible and can benefit from the particular experiences of some of the longtime posters who have been through what can be a tough application process, with some surprises for the unwary. To that extent, Bassdads contribution has been an enormous help to many; the list of summer festivals started by Cosmos is also very helpful. Would that more students posted here with that kind of information! In any event, most here try to speak about what they know, and there have been many longtime posters with students who have looked for and now attend less prominent music programs, and they have been helpful to those looking for such programs. It is good for music aspirants to know, though, that the stakes are high for those who do plan to continue, and for them, going to one of the more competitive programs will probably be an advantage. Unlike other majors, where if you do very well at just about any decent school, you have a chance of getting into graduate school, music performance success going forward also depends on connections you make with teachers and other students, which you cant get at just about any decent school. And graduate school in music is also very competitive: each year there are about 15 or so really competitive applicants for the handful of top programs (each of which takes 1-2 students per year), from which it is reasonably possible to get a job after the PhD.</p>