One of my son’s close friends, a jazz pianist, attends NEC. It’s a great program. Good luck on the applications!
Also everyone reading this thread please post when you hear on live audition invitations! And Thanks @ScreenName48105!
My son’s a junior at NEC and very happy. All kinds of music happening there!
@SpartanDrew I hear you on everyone wanting a different essay. We thought D was done with her MT applications, all she had to do was complete one final artistic app to schedule the audition. Got into the artistic app, 3 pages in specifically, and there it was - a completely novel essay prompt. AND she couldn’t save the work she had already done on the app. So she closed it out and will write the essay this weekend and then start it again. UGH.
@BassTheatreMom , ugh! Hang in there you guys! My D ended up dropping one school towards the end of application season because a similar thing happened when she opened the supplemental app…she had left it for last because it was a distant “maybe I’m interested”, and I was more than a little okay with her exercising that little bit of control at that point. You guys can do this! @SpartanDrew , have you considered making one long audition trip? I know you have discussed audition trips on one or another threads… this is what we decided to do last year, and my D and I were gone for 21 days. In the end, it was actually cheaper than buying all the airfares for us, from the West Coast, and I was very concerned about fatigue and illness (especially for a singer, and with all that flying). Just a thought. It might be worth looking into. We were able to schedule lots of time for campus visits and trial lessons, and we fit in a 3 day break about mid way. We did have to get special permission from 2 of her schools for mid week auditions, but were able to do that and I am so glad we did it that way! We ended up staying in a couple of beautiful B and Bs, where we were the only guests, and they allowed my D to practice on site. And renting AirBnBs several times allowed us to prepare some of our own meals (which definitely cut costs, and was so much healthier), practice at “home”, and be close enough to campuses that we only needed a rental car for one week out of three.
A word of caution for parents considering lengthy trips during audition season: check with your youngster’s high school before making plans. You may be limited in the number of days that she/he can miss classes before it impacts their grades or ability to complete a course (especially when it comes to AP or dual credit courses). While they obviously want your kid to succeed, the school may be constrained by syllabus rules laid down nationally (AP) or by another institution (dual credit) and failures during the second half of the school year can adversely impact college acceptances.
Audition trips are a special bird and guidance counselors & administrations don’t usually understand them because the kids majoring in the usual subjects take their college visit trips during school breaks, send in applications and are done with their acceptances in hand often before the music kids even begin their auditions. A school may have one or two students per year planning on majoring in performance but they can be hesitant to make allowances for them for fear of setting a precedent for attendance issues. Parents can do their part by making an appointment to talk with the guidance counselor early in the season to explain things.
I’ll be starting the pre-screen/audition and acceptance threads shortly, so stay tuned. Good luck to all this season!
Of course, yes! @“Mezzo’sMama” is right. School considerations absolutely come first. Being on the West Coast meant we had a full day of travel each direction for every trip we made, so for instance, if D had a Friday audition, we had to fly on Wednesday, as she sat in on classes and had trial lessons at every school (most teachers won’t give lessons on weekends). Or alternatively, for a Saturday audition we could fly on Friday (not ideal to fly the day before the audition) and spend Sunday in town to stay for campus visits and lessons on Monday and fly home Tuesday. For us, this scenario for 5 or 6 weeks in 2months just didn’t make sense. I felt it would be exhausting for my D, even though I know many do it! Being closer to the East Coast would make a big difference; my D had lots of friends who were able to drive to auditions, or even take short hopper flights. Another thing to consider is weather…there are often flight delays and snags during audition season, and you need to plan extra time for that. I’m not suggesting everyone make a three week trip like we did, but even if you could, say, plan 3 auditions (one mid week, bookmarked by two weekend auditions), it may help with the fatigue of the season. Also, I will say that I enjoyed every single moment of the time spent with my girl during auditions; a very special time.
Our trips totaled maybe 2 weeks out of town. Luckily a couple days were a high school day off - such as a teacher workshop event or such. Fortunately, it was so very clear that S was interested in music and had no record of goofing around, that it was an easy sell to the counselor to be excused. Even if it were not, by the senior year, it was clear what S wanted to do with his self, so a little bit of second-semester high school damage was deemed acceptable.
In retrospect, as we talked with S, if we had done anything that curtailed his musical path in the name of high school, it would have been sad. In fact, it is sort of a close-call since S did hold back some of his musical development in high school to allocate a lot of time to homework, but that might have been recovered in that the AP classes and credit-by-exams helped eliminate almost 30 hours of non-music college classes, so now he has noticeably more free time for music in college.
Living abroad, the way we did it was trying to pair two auditions per trip. My D applications to the schools were planned so that x school would have auditions the same week as Y school. Although risky, it worked out nicely for us minimizing the flight trips to four. She never missed more than two days of school per trip. Granted, by the time of her last weekend trip and all of the changes of weather experienced, she had to audition with cold symptoms at the end and eventually exploded with a nasty cold! Overall it was quite an experience with major parent/daughter bonding time. I split the trips with my wife to minimize cost and missed workdays.
We took 5 plane trips for S’s auditions. I found it interesting that only one required missing school. Most auditions were on the weekend. We saved the lessons and such for his final two choices after acceptance and made separate visits to those. That required missing some school and two more plane trips. We live in Dallas, so airfare is a fantastic deal and I’m very grateful for that. We were juggling S’s senior soccer season, and that was something he didn’t want to sacrifice. It worked well - he missed one game and a couple of practices (his coaches were incredibly encouraging and it never affected his playing time, which is remarkable).
For D, who is auditioning for MT programs, I was thrilled to learn about theatre’s Unified auditions. The schools all gather in LA, Chicago and NYC for several days. The kids can knock out quite a few auditions in a single trip that way.
Unifieds are great for MT majors! We are looking at our schedule and if D is invited everywhere it would require either a week and a half out of school and a 3 or 4 stop airline ticket (unless we change the Miami date if invited) or 2 separate trips. Either way it’s missed school and extra vacation time for me since hubby can’t do any of it. His schedule is worse than mine. D is panicked about missing that much school. Great advice in speaking to the guidance counselor. D is not at a performing arts school and is pretty much the only kid in her school doing anything like this. They have no clue what it’s about and no idea what’s involved so that’s difficult. We will figure it all out I’m certain. I do want her to be able to sit in on classes and spend a little time at each place which may be difficult given the current schedule. All of these auditions are practically on top of each other…
Yes have a conversation with the guidance counselor sooner than later. We were fortunate that each year from my D’s high school there were kids with similar audition issues (and it was not a performance school but a large suburban school). We got the automatic letter second semester that if she missed one more day all her grades would be lowered. The counselor said it was done at the district level and could not be stopped BUT she could over-ride it within the school. We kept in close contact with her and my D suffered no consequences…except being super stressed out due to auditions and homework. Most teachers were understanding and flexible.
Here’s another question that I’ve asked a few people in PM’s and email but wondering what the general consensus is here from all of you pros and experienced parents in this process is. Do admissions and music profs look at the student’s application as a whole before extending invitations for live auditions? Specifically, if your kid doesn’t cut the mustard academically for admission, I’d hope the school would spare a family the expense of travel etc for an audition if there is no chance of admission because of academics or a low SAT score. Maybe that seems obvious but I’m hoping that an invitation for a live audition would mean the student’s overall application from prescreens as well as academics show that they are admissible. Does that make sense? I know that question was asked in a different way on a different thread but I never really felt it was answered specifically to my particular question on live audition invitations.
On a similar note, how many have had experience with going for a live audition (after passing a prescreen) and then not getting admitted at all? I guess the student could go and bomb and audition… From the prescreen to admissions threads from last year it looked like almost all live auditions translated into an acceptance.
@SpartanDrew - S also was a special case in his high school - it was not normal to travel far for a music college.
For schools selected as good fits, I think the conversion rate from pre-screen to offer has got to be pretty decent, if you are not including outlier programs were there might not be a spot for that instrument that year. That’s what we saw based on S’ journey and that of all of hos music friends.
@SpartanDrew My D did not apply to the colleges/programs on your D’s list, so I can’t speak specifically to their practices but we did hear from two unis that they would do a quick screen of students’ academic record to see if they were “in range” before offering an audition. The music school admissions people alluded to “not wasting people’s time”. But the final decision for academic acceptance was up to Admissions after a regular formal review. Also, please do not assume that passing a pre-screen means an acceptance. Not everyone posts all their information on the prescreen and admissions threads - due to laziness, privacy concerns, boredom with the long process, whatever, those threads don’t present complete information. I don’t think we posted all my D’s prescreens - life just got busy. My D was waitlisted at one music school where she passed a prescreen. In 2015, one college’s music school told us that they usually receive 1,100 applications (instrumental and vocal) and ask 60% to audition (660). About 220 of those 660 are accepted and 100 enroll. Those were the most specific numbers that we received.
With regard to missing classes, it is important to understand your district’s/school’s policies but also have your student communicate in detail with his/her teachers well before the trips begin. D communicated that we were trying to schedule auditions to minimize missing class time, but that it would be impossible not to miss some days. We found that the teachers were very supportive of her traveling (some forgave work), with only her gym teacher being rigid about it (!).
My D was also an unusual case for her high school, but we received a lot of support for missing so much school, and she took a reduced schedule second semester on purpose. For voice, passing a prescreen is in no way a promise of admission artistically; for example, I know that Oberlin accepted a class of 16 VP majors this year, and saw a lot more at in person auditions (although I’m not sure how many exactly). My D had only 3 prescreens; she wasn’t invited for a live audition in one case and was ultimately offered admission by all her other schools (the prescreen she failed may have been a case of not being an academic match, as it was a serious reach school for her academically, but of course there is no way to really know). In our experience, @SpartanDrew , schools that use stringent academic standards all review an applicant academically BEFORE the live audition. In every case, I think, my D received notice of academic admission prior to the audition. Some programs are much more audition based, and a terrific audition can make or break admission, and so you won’t hear anything until after the audition. My D’s academic stats were by no means spectacular, but not bad either, except her standardized test scores, which were just a few points from the bottom end of requirements for some of the highly competitive programs; in terms of some of the schools she applied to, she would have been very on the edge if not for artistic merit. I hope that helps!
I’ll try to get to the heart of the matter. There are so many variables to how schools accept…a single acceptance or two separate. And you should research it and keep it in mind…in case money and time get tight. But even if you assume an academic acceptance at all then you move on to how selective, affordability, desirability…honestly you will find reasons to question a plane ticket to any school. So here’s some advice:
Assume every audition invite is serious (bc it is). It’s an honor that few will receive.
Of course you have a budget. And any long shots academically as well as highly selective programs (Juilliard and Curtis) or unaffordable schools with low or no merit must be considered. But that bridge can be crossed after the pre-screen results.
And no not everyone gets accepted after auditions. But if you pass most of your pre-screens you’re on the right track and should feel confident. You need a lot of blind faith in this process. We all did it and you will too.
We didn’t arrange sample lessons or sitting in on classes until after acceptance, and at that point, my kid only went into that kind of depth of exploration with two of the 6 schools she was originally considering.
We were lucky I guess. NYC school coordinate auditions, so that was one trip, and we went out to Ohio. The others were in Boston, close to where we live. I guess it was about 5 or 6 missed school days. My kid got the work in advance from teachers and tried to keep up as I remember.
Thanks everyone. Very helpful information. And no by no means do we think that passing a prescreen means a promise of admission. I just hope that being invited to audition means D is “admissible”. Her GPA is good, SAT is low so that’s why I ask. She is a terrible standardized test taker and after private tutoring and a repeat exam it didn’t improve. So I’m hoping her vocal skills will trump all and still get her into schools that are tough by academic standards.