<p>I was wondering if any of the CC music majors regulars own or have seen this book by Carole J. Everett (the Performing Arts Major's College Guide) , because I'm interested in ordering it. If you have, please tell me what you thought of it and if it was helpful.</p>
<p>We bought this book ( sounds like it anyway) in the 1996 edition. There are some uses for it, though each must be taken with a grain of salt.
It rates college programs in dance, theater and music, and mentions specific instruments which have a strong studio.
The problem is that teachers move around or retire, the fancy name teacher may only work with grad students etc. I think as you start your reading this is a great book. Once it is closer to audition time you need to get up to the minute info on which teachers are best for you.</p>
<p>I agree with Oldin. We found the book a good starting place. It did getting us looking at some schools that we might not have looked at otherwise. It also has a very nice section at the beginning on the whole process of choosing and applying to arts schools. I also agree that you need to not put much credence in the recommendations for various instruments.</p>
<p>We bought the older edition at the beginning of D's junior year in high school, and found it helpful as a starting point to supplement suggestions from teachers and other professionals. And yes, teachers move around, retire, and die sometimes, so it's important to get updated info and plan visits to any interesting schools.</p>
<p>Agreed w/OldinJersey. We got this book very early on, D's freshman year I think, and it was good for getting our thinking organized and as a starting point. But as OiJ says it has info that may be either too broad, or outdated. </p>
<p>Suggestion: I see it often on shelves in Borders and Barnes and Noble -- would definitely be worth "browsing" through it the next time you're in a bookstore.</p>
<p>We didn't buy it - got it from the library! It was a great jumping-off place for us - suggesting schools we'd never considered. Also was eye-opening to see some well-known and respected schools NOT recommended (or at least not "recommended strongly") for certain areas. This was long before I'd discovered CC, and was brand new to the music application process. So things that are now "mantra" here on CC, eg. "it's not the school, it's the teacher" were new concepts to me.</p>
<p>I went through the book, found schools recommended for horn, then S2 took the list to his teacher, who gave him feedback on each school. Everything from, "Great school; great teacher" to "they have a new teacher" or "know nothing about them" or even "there's a lot of politics at that school" or "great teacher; poor program, mediocre orchestra, etc....." We found it really useful to have a concrete list to start with.</p>
<p>As I recall, the book had a lot of good advice about the audition process, too.</p>
<p>Hmm.... we used somebody's Guide to Schools for the Performing Arts. Was it this one? The one we had had sections for high schools, summer programs and colleges. It also had excellent chapters on writing resumes, audition protocol (things like what clothes to wear, etc). I thought it was Petersens or Barrons. My recollection was that the editors had somehow been affiliated with admissions at maybe Juilliard at some point. It was an excellent resource. The only advice I would give...ignore the tuitions...remember it takes several years for a book to be published and the tuition and fees costs published in these books do not reflect the increased costs. But...if you like a school from what you read, you can always go to the school website now and seek the rest of that info.</p>
<p>There are three such guides that I have seen:</p>
<p>Peterson's Professional Degree Programs in the Visual & Performing Arts, 2003 Edition, ISBN 0768908183</p>
<p>The Performing Arts Major's College Guide, 3rd edition by Carole J. Everett, copyright 1998, ISBN 0028619137</p>
<p>The Princeton Review Guide to Perfoming Arts Programs, by Carole J. Everett and Muriel Topaz, copyright 1998, ISBN 0375750959</p>
<p>These are the editions that I have and there are probably newer ones of each. The Princeton Review Guide is the one with the Summer program information. They are all interesting but it is very hard to keep them up to date. I agree that they are useful for finding programs that may have otherwise been overlooked.</p>
<p>We also got it from the library, then bought an updated copy, talked to teachers, found out about summer music programs, sent son to NMC and then he changed his mind about music anyway. He's now a very happy lawyer. (g)
The most important part of the book we read was the opening part, which stated basically - if you can enjoy doing anything else, major in that and do music for fun.</p>