<p>Hi, I'm a sophomore in high school and i REALLY want to major in musical theatre in college. The thing is my school is really focused in academics and all it has is a drama department which i cannot join since i'm in a program that makes me take a language each year so i have no time for drama. Also, i CANNOT read music at all and have no clue how to learn. I'm pretty scared since i dont know how i'm supposed to audition without knowing how to. But, i was looking at UC Irvine since i wanna go there, and you dont audition for musical theatre major until after freshman year, so will this give me time to learn how to read music? Like is there classes? I have no idea how this works & i have no time to take classes outside of school because of sports. Thanks (:</p>
<p>First off, I don’t want to sound critical, but if you are serious about majoring in musical theatre, then you need experience. The audition process for musical theatre is absolutely grueling and competitive; you will be competing for a spot against dozens of others who have had years of training and experience. If you “don’t have time” to take music lessons outside of sports, then perhaps you need to re-evaluate your priorities and MAKE time for them, because the chances of you being accepted at a musical theatre program with literally no training or experience are extremely slim.</p>
<p>However, there is no reason to worry: It seems that you will be auditioning for a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Musical Theatre, which is not a Bachelor of Music, so you won’t need as much musical training as a potential music major. Focus on learning monologues, acting, and you really need to take voice lessons if you want to prepare for auditions. </p>
<p>Is there any way you can participate in a community theatre production, since you can’t take drama at school?</p>
<p>I would have to agree with herranrukous. Unfortunately, when you get to high school in this day and age you have to make decisions as to what extracurriculars you want to do and not do. If you have decided to do sports, and it doesn’t give you time to do things like dance lessons, performances, voice lessons, etc you are going to be way behind the curve when it comes to auditioning for MT programs. As for the language, that I need clarification on. My D had to take language as well, but used her electives for choir and theater classes. Are you telling me that you have no elective courses you take, and that there is no choir at your school where you can gain vocal experience?</p>
<p>If you are unable to get any MT experience in high school, it is unlikely you will gain admittance to an auditioned MT program. Further you would have no way of knowing if you enjoy it enough, or have enough talent, to make it a career. Maybe it would be wiser to select a different major in a school that has a very open theater department for non-majors. You may be able to double major or minor once you get there and know it is a viable path. </p>
<p>I will add that the choices we make have impact on our lives. You are choosing the path you are taking. My daughter was the Captain of the JV Volleyball team her sophomore year of high school which meant that she could not perform in her high school’s fall musical. However, she still took dance classes and voice lessons at night, and joined a theater rep at a local community theater which allowed her to take acting classes and perform in their shows. She took Chorus and Acting in school. After sophomore year she dropped volleyball so she could become more involved in her high school theater. Summer programs can be expensive, and are certainly not required, but if you can afford it, that’s another way to get experience. My daughter attended a performing arts camp for 9 summers. For the year+ leading up to auditions, she was coached by MTCA. I do not think coaching is a requirement but it helped her immensely. </p>
<p>I tell you this to give you an idea of the experience of many of the applicants you will be competing against. We all hear stories of the kid who blows everyone away without any training but that is the extremely rare case. If you think you want to do MT at all, do it for fun now to test the waters. Find a way to work on at least one of the components (acting, voice, dance) and see where it takes you. You have 1.5 years to figure out where you will apply to college, make the choices that work best for you.</p>
<p>Thanks so much (: i’m going to see if i can do community theatre and try to make time for it</p>
<p>Your other option would be to apply to a school that has a drama/musical theater major that doesn’t require an audition. There are options like that.</p>
<p>Or apply to one of the schools that have auditions but it is a BA program. There is not as much competition at those - a few examples would be DeSales, Wilkes, Rhode Island College and Western Connecticut State University. The pool you are up against is 30 -50 - instead of the 200-500 students auditioning at the top BFA schools. I would still recommend some training - in either voice or dance - for the next 2 years, but you can get into these without extensive training or experience.</p>
<p>To echo what everyone is saying, you really should plan to get some training. Community theatre will help some though likely not as much as taking classes; my recommendation would be to seek out a company that will help train you on some of the basics and uses teaching elements throughout their productions. If you can, take some lessons though - acting, voice, dance, whatever you able to do. </p>
<p>I also want to clarify something the njmissy said, which is true, but note that not ALL BA programs are uncompetitive for admission. It is true that some of them are, but the operative word there is ‘some.’ Likewise, there are ‘some’ BFA programs that are less competitive. Choosing the right schools to audition for based upon your capabilities and needs and having some non-audition safeties, as theatremom suggests, is all a part of the process…but it IS doable! Along the same lines, something else you could consider as a potential option for yourself: some BFA programs that are more competitive will refer applicants instead to their BA Theatre program with the option of re-auditioning at the end of the freshman year (Ball State, Coastal Carolina and Point Park do this, to name a few). If you were open to that as an option, you could always try a couple of those programs knowing there may be a way to receive excellent training for a year and then try to move into the BFA if you weren’t to be accepted.</p>
<p>Sending you a private message also!</p>
<p>A really good place to start is Mary Anna Dennard’s book, “I Got In - The Ultimate College Audition Guide For Acting And Musical Theatre 2012 Edition.” You an order this from Amazon for $15.00. It describes the college theatre audition process in detail and what you need to do to prepare. Reading this book is the quickest and easiest way that I know to begin to get up to speed on the complex world of college theatre programs (and I have done TONS of research on this topic).</p>
<p>There are non-audition Musical Theatre programs, both BFA and BA, which might be a good fit if you find it hard to prepare sufficiently to compete for audition-based programs during high school. Since you mentioned UCI, here are a few in California:</p>
<p>-- California Lutheran University (BA w/MT emphasis)
– California State University, Chico (BA MT)
– California State University, East Bay (BA w/MT option)
– California State University, Northridge (BA Theatre, MT Minor)
– California State University, San Bernadino (BA w/MT emphasis)</p>
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<p>MT Coach - I’m not sure where you got your information about schools that re-audition BAs for BFA because Coastal Carolina is not one of them.</p>
<p>At the on campus auditions, kjgc tells the entire audition group of students (and parents) that some students who are not offered BFA spots will be offered BA spots. He makes it very clear that the BA is a separate degree and is not a stepping stone for the BFA.</p>
<p>Take a look at the Big List of MT Programs by Program Type thread. Just skip to the last page which has the most updated list. The list breaks down programs by Non-Audition vs Audition and BA vs BFA. There is also a BA-to-BFA section at the end of the list that lists programs which hold auditions after a year or two to get into the BFA program. </p>
<p>Also, I echo MTCoach that not all BAs are less competitive than all BFAs. I am pretty sure JMU had over 500 applicants and Alabama had over 200, not sure about the numbers for Marymount but I bet it was very high. Some BFA programs surely do not attract that many applicants. You cannot assume a level of competition solely based on BA vs BFA.</p>
<p>do-what-u-luv: I have a student who was not admitted for the BFA at CCU and received the letter offering her a spot in the BA program. I was posting that comment from memory, as I thought when she told me about it, there was mention that she could re-audition for the BFA in the future. </p>
<p>I suppose I should clarify for ANY of those programs that I listed, the BA is not a stepping stone, as you call it. Simply, there is a possibility of an alternate degree offered if not accepted for the BFA, and with a year of training under one’s belt, a student could choose to reapply. Whether they move into the BFA track from there remains unseen.</p>
<p>All of that said, if you are BA track at CCU, and you are not permitted to apply to switch to the BFA, I will concede that I am wrong. Again, just speaking from memory.</p>
<p>I personally know of only one student who has moved from the BA track to the BFA track, but that is a very rare exception. I just want to be clear that that is quite different from school where the natural progression is from a BA to a BFA. Coastal’s BA degree is not set up as a pre-BFA, it is its own entity and meets the needs of many students. </p>
<p>Before 2012, all of the MT and Acting degrees were BAs - minor changes were made to transition to BFA. The class of 2014 are the first to spend all four years as BFA students. The BA and BFA at Coastal Carolina are now completely different degrees with completely different curriculum and purposes. </p>
<p>Coastal currently offers the following theatre degrees:
BFA Musical Theatre
BFA Acting
BFA Physical Theatre
BFA Design & Technology</p>
<p>BA Dramatic Arts - *"This program is designed for students whose goals require the study of more than one area of theatre, or who want a program with more flexibility than the B.F.A.</p>
<p>This includes students who wish to pursue careers in stage management, arts administration, playwriting, or directing. B.A. students are encouraged to take an active role in designing their own degree plan and to take extensive coursework in other areas. </p>
<p>The B.A. is a good choice for students who enjoy studying a broad range of topics as well as performing, designing, stage managing or any other production possibility. </p>
<p>Only a short interview is required for BA candidates. This can take place via phone. In order to set up an interview please contact Ken Martin (<a href=“mailto:kmartin@coastal.edu”>kmartin@coastal.edu</a>). However, if the student wishes to be considered for a talent based scholarship an audition or portfolio review and interview is necessary."*</p>
<p>Maybe kjgc or AlexaMT can clarify a bit more on this topic…</p>
<p>Thank you for being so persistent with clarifying this, do-what-u-luv. I clearly misspoke, and my apologies to anyone who was misinformed by my original post or still believed I was pushing that the BA to BFA was a natural transition after reading my second post, in which I conceded that I could have been wrong. Though the portion of text which you cite doesn’t indicate one way or the other whether or not there is any possibility of a student moving to the BFA if their interests or choices were to move in that direction after being accepted, I did follow up with my student who said the letter to which I was referring was NOT from CCU but instead a different school. You have done your due diligence in bringing this mistake to my attention.</p>
<p>And again, just to make it very clear, the other schools of which I spoke (Point Park and Ball State) that allow BA students the possibility of reauditioning for the BFA: I do not believe it’s a natural transition for those students either, simply an option which may or may not pan out for the student after their second audition. Sorry for any confusion.</p>
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I hate to be a nit-picker, but this is not stated correctly for Point Park. You have to audition for entry to the Point Park Conservatory and everyone enters as a BA MT student. Auditions for entry are very competitive. Students then audition (again) for entry for the BFA MT program during their sophomore year. There is no non-audition “fallback” BA program (which was sort of implied in the quote).</p>
<p>Ball State has a non-audition “fallback” BA Theatre Studies program and students may audition in their Freshman year for entry to the BFA MT program.</p>
<p>“Or apply to one of the schools that have auditions but it is a BA program. There is not as much competition at those - a few examples would be DeSales, Wilkes, Rhode Island College and Western Connecticut State University. The pool you are up against is 30 -50.”</p>
<p>This may be true of the schools mentioned above (I honestly do not know the specifics of audition-to-acceptance numbers at those schools). However, not all auditioned BA programs see a significantly smaller number of applicants than some auditioned BFA programs. At JMU we saw more than that this year… I believe that Northern Colorado likely did as well. At JMU this year we had about a 13% admit rate for Musical Theatre and a 33% admit rate for Theatre… Better than a 2% admit rate… </p>
<p>Ultimately, all students (unless they would rather take gap year) should apply to a wide range of schools at which they would be happy and could afford, and include a non-auditioned academic and financial safety school on the list that they would be happy to attend. 
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<p>If you do not read music now, nor have much experience, do what you can to learn these skills and to take advantage of any experiences that you can. This will not only set you up for auditions for schools, BUT prepare you for a career in the performing arts.</p>
<p>There are also programs like the ones at Columbia College in Chicago that don’t require an audition. Still, get yourself some experience and training first, to make sure this is something you even want to do. It’s all nice to think about it but if you really don’t have an idea of what the day to day life of a theater kid is like, you might be in for quite a surprise. What makes you think musical theater is something you will enjoy if you haven’t given it a try yet?</p>
<p>MTCoach - we must be neighbors, or nearly neighbors; we should meet for coffee!!! And after all that, I’m buying!!! ;)</p>
<p>do-what-u-luv…haha we probably are relatively close to each other (I’m just south of Detroit, right on the water) and I travel as far as Brighton / Ann Arbor / Sterling Heights and anything in between them and me for work. That was quite a go-around eh? As long as it’s tea, I’m down :)</p>