Peabody

<p>Can anyone tell me more about this school? What is the music AND academic education that I can receive? Anyone know anything about violin professor Keng-Yuen Tseng?</p>

<p>thelovelybones, did you audition in person at Peabody or do a regional? When my daughter auditioned there, Professor Keng-Yuen Tseng was running the panel. He was extremely charming and welcoming. Her own teacher at her precollege spoke highly of him. Many people will say that an advantage of being at Peabody is the ability to take classes at Johns Hopkins. I wonder, however, how often this is accomplished due to the difficulties of scheduling and transportation. I have heard mixed reviews about orchestra at Peabody and extremely high praise about the chamber music faculty.</p>

<p>Not that it has anything to do with the violin instruction but you might be interested in the responses to the questions I posted on the JHU forum:</p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/johns-hopkins-university/1121774-peabody.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/johns-hopkins-university/1121774-peabody.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>When my S and I visited Peabody a couple of years ago, we asked our student tour guide about taking classes at JHU, and she essentially said that nobody really does that. In fact, she said that most students try to take their gen ed classes at community college when they’re home in the summer. As a senior, she was taking her first class at JHU.</p>

<p>We know someone who is getting a double major in a science and in music performance at Peabody/Johns Hopkins.</p>

<p>i did a regional audition so i did not have a chance of visiting the school or meet any of the faculty members.</p>

<p>thelovelybones, have you visited any of the schools you are considering? It’s hard to make a choice without any first-hand knowledge. We did visit Peabody last April to get an idea of what the school was like in session and we liked the atmosphere. It was a beautiful day when we were there and the neighborhood around the school was appealing. The students seemed happy-- and many of them gave unsolicited positive reviews about the school. It was a much better vibe than we got during the stressful audition day. We got to visit some dorm rooms (this was not an official tour; my daughter had a lesson with a teacher and we were otherwise just poking around.) The dorms were not remarkable (i.e., they were fine, not disgusting and not fabulous.) The cafeteria seemed pretty small, but that is also true of the cafeterias at every conservatory we visited. There was a really terrific pizza place, one of the best I’ve been to ever, a few blocks from the school. The school is in a trendy urban neighborhood, very close to the Amtrak train that will take you to DC or Philly/NY, Boston.</p>

<p>I know a couple of first-rate musicians who are Peabody products and my D and I visited when she was shopping schools a few years back. Physically, the school is quite different from many of the others. It occupies a full city block and appears to be a lot of attached row houses. Inside is a warren of hallways and staircases that we found bewildering. One could, I believe, enter the building in September and not set foot outside until Thanksgiving break. Honestly, the word that came into my mind was “Hogwarts”.</p>

<p>Much of it has an ambiance I can only describe as industrial (although that hardly makes it unique among music schools) but the living space I saw looked reasonably comfortable and the performance venues appeared to be rather nice.</p>

<p>The neighborhood in which it’s located is somewhat iffy but, given that my D wound up at Eastman in downtown Rochester, I’m not so sure Peabody’s 'hood is any worse.</p>

<p>Will it work for you? I’d say, go see it before you ever commit. As we were heading back North on I-95, my D told me that Peabody was off her list. She said she found it way too claustrophobic and couldn’t imagine spending four years there. When I made that comment on here a couple of years ago, a Peabody parent stated how the very thing that ran my kid off made her’s feel secure. I guess that’s why there’s more than one school.</p>

<p>I live in Baltimore and have spent a lot of time in the neighborhood and in Peabody because my D sang with the Children’s Chorus for years. Personally, I love the neighborhood. I go to the area often for art, great restaurants, cheap improv theater, etc. One of my D’s best friends is at Peabody and she loves visiting her there.</p>

<p>But that library at Peabody would make up for many faults. I think I remember that they said they filmed part of National Treasure there? </p>

<p>And the courtyard was charming.</p>

<p>I absolutely loved the area around Peabody–so charming (I did not find it industrial at all, with its row houses and little courtyard and square!). It is also a very small school, and definitely not for everyone.</p>

<p>Thank you for all of your advice. Peabody offered me the most financially, so I am debating whether if I should choose it over CIM.</p>

<p>Haven’t been myself (but it is top of my list of potential grad schools), but I know alumni and current students, and all of them only have the best to say about it. It is indeed a more intimate setting, but if you click then I can’t recommend it enough. Lovely area too.</p>

<p>Whose studio would you be in at CIM?</p>

<p>roscatcello, are you referring to peabody???</p>