Can anyone suggestion violin faculty who could listen to a very good violinist who is planning to apply for double degree (BM / BS) programs at Carnegie Mellon, Michigan, Northwestern, Oberlin, Rice, USC, UCLA Hoping for visits and trial lessons this summer. (I know, not the best timing, but fingers crossed…)
I don’t have recommendations for faculty as my S is not a violinist, but as a parent of a double degree applicant from last year, I can advise you to remove Rice from your list. I somehow got the idea that Rice would be a good choice (based, maybe, on my voracious reading of CC?). S and I even made the long trek down to Houston to meet with admissions at Shepherd and to have a sample lesson. When admissions heard that S wanted to pursue a dual degree, the big chill ensued. We quickly learned that there is no formal dual degree program. If you want to try, you will be on your own with no support from the school, and any degree from a STEM area is out of the question because of the conflict between classes and ensemble rehearsals. I kicked myself all the way home for not doing better research about Shepherd before putting ourselves through the trip. Your other choices look good. Consider Eastman/U Rochester and Peabody/Johns Hopkins if you haven’t already.
nycm, I sent you a PM.
Thanks @dec51995 ; I have heard that Rice would be a tough on dual degree candidates, but was holding out hope there might be a sympathetic string teacher or two! I guess not, and we will take it off the list!
Both Eastman and Peabody are possible, but I know that it’s a bit harder to manage between separate campuses.
Yep to logistic difficulties of Eastman and Peavody. In my experience, no one values the dual degree students more–or makes the degree more logistically simple–than Oberlin. But I know nothing of Michigan or the California schools, so take that with a grain of salt. Also, though I am poaching on SpiritManager’s territory, you might investigate Bard.
Strongly recommend Lawrence as well. People love it. http://www.lawrence.edu/conservatory/ There is a double degree program and college and conservatory are on the same campus, much like Oberlin.
Bard comes up a lot too. not only do teachers there support double degree but it is required of every conservatory student.
I know I am not answering your question 
!!
Our D looked at several of the schools on your list, but she is a hornist (pursuing BM in horn perf and BS in biomed engr at UMich). If you don’t get personal recommendations about a studio, she recommends emailing or talking to the faculty directly to gauge their support. From her perspective, dual degree was a must-have. She was very up front in her initial emails requesting lessons and found that the level of support could vary within a school, and varied a lot across the schools she considered. Talking to double degree students on her visits also helped her determine how “doable” the path.
“…found that the level of support could vary within a school, and varied a lot across the schools she considered.”
Exactly what we found, @MomOf2TeenGirls. It varied from an assumption that the other degree was a fallback rather than a true interest (and that S was a lesser player because he wanted a dual degree) to an embracing of the dual-degree student with the claim that some of the strongest music performance students are those who have an outside interest and so “have something to say” with their music.
ducks head Note that I said “some of the strongest music students” not “all of the strongest music students.” I don’t want to get angry retorts from those who aren’t dual degree. Just presenting the wide difference in perspective we found. And Rice seemed to be well over on the first side, not the second.
Many thanks for all these responses, but I’m still hoping for some names of individual violin faculty we could contact at some of these schools. Even Oberlin, which I know to be very friendly to Double Degree students, has several violin faculty members.Perhaps they all are supportive? And Bard has 11 on faculty for violin! (I think because few are full time) so it’s a bit difficult to know which teachers would be best to meet with for a lesson in advance.
I would start with the best fit for your violinist and then worry about double-degree compatibility. Have you asked your child’s teacher for names? That’s where we started. You can learn teacher’s stance after you find out whether the teacher is interested in working with your son/daughter and vice versa. Teachers may even change their minds about working with double degree students if they want to work with your violinist. Another suggestion is to post this on the individual college/conservatory pages to see if you can get a response from current students. And don’t be afraid to contact faculty “cold.”