National Competitions

What has been your experience/opinion regarding national competitions? I am mostly referring to vocal/MT competitions like YoungArts, Classical Singer, NATS, etc. Is the experience worth the expense of a trip to the national conventions? I know the exposure is different for preprofessional competitors, I am asking for a high school student.

Thanks for the input.

I hear Young arts is great. I’d apply junior year if you can. I think the program is in January and that’s a lot with auditions. Senior year.

So far for us I would say yes. Went to SETC this year and was a great way for S18 to test his chops, see the competition and get great feedback. Headed to Classical Singer in a few weeks for MT and Classical divisions. Now that he has decided to study Music-VP in college we hope he will get some good exposure and advice. Plus, its also fun and exciting. I also think any audition/performance experience at this point is good for him, as he prepares for fall/winter audition season.

My kid did YoungArts. It’s really quite an easy process. Or it least it was - things could have changed of course.

Things may have changed, since D is now a couple years out of college, but she was invited to both the National YoungArts Miami Finals and the NATS MT National Finals and in both cases her expenses were paid, so the cost of the trip was not a consideration. Her only expense was the initial submission fee.

@mom2MTgal, I don’t think that Classical Singer competition, - if you are referring to this one, - is particularly worth attending, unless you think you have a great shot at placing at least as a finalist, because they select a huge amount of first round winners, and everyone is invited to compete at semi-finals. As far as YoungArts, NATS at any level and Hal Leonard, it is something that will look really good on resume if won. D participated in all of the above, and you are welcome to PM me if you have any questions.

I am sorry to say but the information provided above for Classical Singer is incorrect. My daughter participated in the past 2 years so we have first-hand experience. Classical Singer has 4 rounds: 1st, 2nd, semi-finals, and finals. While my daughter advanced to the 2nd round her first year, I know of several talented kids who did not make it past the 1st round, so not everyone advances. If I recall correctly they advance the top 50% to the 2nd round. The 2nd round is much more competitive and only about 30 kids will advance to the semi-finals. Last year there were 32 musical theatre semi-finalists in the high school division, my daughter being one of them. Classical Singer was a great experience for many reasons, but only when my daughter started college auditions earlier this year did I realize what a wonderful prep Classical Singer was for college auditions, because the auditions are conducted in such a similar way. When we went to Unifieds earlier this year it felt just like going to another Classical Singer competition, with the hallways full of performers awaiting their audition slot, the singing you hear coming out from behind each closed door, and the audition rooms with several auditors behind a table, some with an accompanist - it all felt familiar and much less intimidating then it could have been!