<p>violinist. i go to UCLA. it also depends on your instrument. oboe players spend a time making reeds, vocalists cannot sing too much to hurt their throats/voices.</p>
<p>Loves2Sing, your daughter’s GPA and ACT seem inline with the mid to upper admit profiles of both USC and UMich academically provided her high school is considered rigorous, so I wouldn’t worry too much about that (provided she holds them). </p>
<p>And just so you know, I too felt my son and I were a day late and a dollar short when junior year rolled around, but a well spent summer and a few miracles resulted in the perfect outcome for us, so TRUST THE PROCESS ;)</p>
<p>Re: your question re: summer camp – I’d concur with your sense the it would benefit her to progress over the summer whether she had the scholarship or not. In my son’s case, his summer program resulted in an award, a chance to tour Europe the following year, and an outstanding recommendation that no doubt influenced his acceptance at school. And he’d blown his audition!!! Sometimes the universe rewards blind faith and complete un-stop-ability ;)</p>
<p>Loves2Sing, My d, was accepted to her 3 top choices-UCLA(ethnomusicology), Berklee and USC pop music. She did the Berklee 5 week program last summer-no scholarship- and it made a huge difference in her abilities and passion. She began to write many more songs and was inspired by all those talented kids around her so it was worth every penny. Competition is tough!</p>
<p>USC is very strong in science as well as music and we are thrilled that she will be attending for 2010. PM me if you want more details-its not too late-take the AP Bio if she has a strong science interest.</p>
<p>What we learned-live auditions are best.
Stay true to your dream-don’t bother with classical programs if you don’t love them(for pop musicians that is).
Show a strong interest in the school you want to attend-visit, meet the faculty, ask questions.
Look good-nice clothes and grooming Eat well-stay hydrated -be rested!
Relax and be friendly!
Follow you dream and good grades and SAT scores are very important, as is a good essay!</p>
<p>Finally enjoy the process. Auditions are a great way to have family time, enjoy your s or d before they leave the nest!
ps Bring your navi on trips if u rent a car</p>
<p>I learned a lot during this process, and so did my daughter. The process was more difficult that we expected. My two older children (not music majors) both got into their first-choice programs slightly earlier than we expected, so we never even had time to get anxious. #3 daughter, going into music, had spent 11 years in fairly intense preparation, including high-level pre-college and summer programs. </p>
<p>We thought we were on top of things, but a number of unforeseen things happened. For example, my daughter’s teacher became ill unexpectedly in the fall and was missing during much of her critical preparation time (the teacher has since recovered completely). In the past, my daughter did a lot of performing prior to any big audition, but this year she barely go to perform any of her college audition rep in advance of auditions because we were so busy scrambling to try to arrange sub lessons, and dealing with other issues not related to auditions. </p>
<p>My daughter also received some advice (such as to only apply to one studio per school) which went against my instincts, but which she followed anyway. And it was not the best advice. Although I acted as a facilitator for my daughter’s applications (travel-agent, check-writer), my daughter made her own decisions and her own contacts.</p>
<p>Audition season was very difficult. The weather was an unpredictable and stressful factor. We managed to make it to all of the auditions, but the anxiety level was quite high as we were chased around the country by blizzards (like everyone else auditioning.) Because of my daughter’s teacher’s illness, my daughter felt less prepared for her auditions than she has in the past; some of her pieces were not seasoned at all. The first time she ever played her Bach Fugue was in her first audition (where she ended up with a large merit scholarship-- but talk about stress.) If we had foreseen all of the roadblocks in our path, she would have chosen a more seasoned Bach suite. But my daughter has always been ambitious about repertoire and wanted to bring a new Bach to her auditions. </p>
<p>Auditions results were all over the place, and seemed not to always correlate with her playing: she was rejected by the two schools where she felt she played near-perfect auditions (one of the results I am sure is because of poor advice concerning studio applications.) Her first and shakiest audition yielded a very large merit award; she was initially wait-listed for her two top-choice schools. Then she ended up being accepted to both with decent merit scholarships. </p>
<p>We had assumed that everything would be decided by April 1; but for our family the drama continued, with almost daily developments, until the first week of May. She was lucky to get off her wait-lists early; I know a number of kids for whom the drama continues.</p>
<p>My daughter’s teacher kept her grounded by continually reminding her that nothing in these results changed anything about who she was as a musician. </p>
<p>The collective wisdom of this group was very valuable to us, but sometimes the advice was not quite accurate for our particular situation, and some facts were wrong, so I’m glad that we did our own checking and follow-up. I am extremely grateful to those parents who contacted me off list with PMs and emails offering support and anecdotes from their own experience. </p>
<p>I also learned a lot from other parents who are not on this list. It is not in my nature or my daughter’s to be aggressively self-promotional. But during the period that my daughter was wait-listed, other parents knocked some sense into me by pointing out that it was now or never. My daughter took a deep breath and then asked people to advocate for her to admissions offices. She also called and visited the offices of the two places she was wait-listed, where she expressed her sincere and detailed interest in the schools. She sent them updated resumes highlighting Spring 2010 performances. Each call was logged by the offices. She also contacted her potential teachers. And my husband and I followed up explaining our family’s support. </p>
<p>After my daughter was admitted to the school she will attend from the wait-list, she was left to the task of finding a teacher. The office told her (based on their knowledge) that her first-choice teacher was completely booked, and that there was no chance of being in his studio. She was ready to accept this at face value and so was I, but a staff member at her pre-college urged her to go directly to the teacher (with whom she’d had a wonderful lesson back in October). She did, and the teacher found room for her. If she had not contacted this teacher directly, she would not have been able to study with him.</p>
<p>We were also told that it is very rare for wait-listed students to receive merit scholarships. I do think that this is changing as the nature of the wait-list seems to be evolving for colleges in general. My family prepared detailed letters for the Financial Aid offices explaining our situation. The result was that she did receive a decent merit scholarship. Or perhaps the result would have been the same if we had not prepared the letter, but I’m so glad we did not leave that stone unturned because the scholarship has made the difference in her ability to attend this school.</p>
<p>We went into this process knowing that there were 3 schools/studios where my daughter felt she would be equally happy. The result, 10 or more months later, is that she will be in one of those schools/studios. The road turned out to be a lot more difficult than had she been accepted immediately on April 1. But, as she said, she feels that she learned so much in this process about how to advocate for herself and how the world works.</p>
<p>“My daughter’s teacher kept her grounded by continually reminding her that nothing in these results changed anything about who she was as a musician.”</p>
<p>BRAVA!</p>
<p>Great post glassharmonica.</p>
<p>Glassharmonica: Thanks for posting! Congratulations to both your daughter and you. It is good to see that focus, persistence, and talent are eventually rewarded in a system which has so much inherent randomness and yet which has such high stakes.</p>
<p>I agree with your emphasis on advocacy and communication. As important as the audition is, it does not stand in isolation. While S is happy with his results and his decision, we could have made the whole application/audition process easier for him had we more persistently asked more pointed questions directly of the schools and the potential studio teachers.</p>
<p>I was so lucky to find CC three years ago. It helped me to make a long-term plan - one which worked. It included summer programs, courses of study, repertoire, auditioning skills, etc. Best advice I can give is to make a plan starting when you’re a freshman. I should have read more links about scholarships - I would have pushed more on the community service aspect because so many general scholarships focus on that component and I don’t know that we ever talked about that on the music majors thread. I would tell folks to look hard for local scholarships such as music clubs, opera guilds, or local corporations and don’t just wait till senior year. PERHAPS I should have listened to my D more when she wanted to eliminate some schools from the audition process. She eliminated a lot of those schools in her head after junior year visits. However, hindsight is 20/20 and I don’t think I would have been comfortable with only three schools. In reality, she only wanted one school anyway. My background is marketing so we just did what I knew which was take a product and market it. Write the essays early and get your letters of recommendation as soon as senior year starts. My D had no consternation about auditioning, we had no sickness and carried throatcoat, we overcame the weather travel, we knew where to stay and where to eat, we sent everything by UPS and it went early. Thanks CC, I’ve been taking notes for years and it saved me a lot of headaches.</p>
<p>for those that haven’t seen it <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/music-major/897086-things-we-learned-music-application-process.html?highlight=things+learned[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/music-major/897086-things-we-learned-music-application-process.html?highlight=things+learned</a></p>
<p>Thought I would bring this back up. Just returned from Boston last weekend and have a big suggestion that has since been confirmed by a few that have been through this.</p>
<p>Try to leave 2 days before your audition when traveling across country. We had a 7am flight to Boston from the West coast that had mechanical problems. 5 hour delay caused us to miss connection. I called while still sitting on the runway and had the flight changed but the earliest arrival time I could get was 10pm. It all worked out and S was asleep in hotel at 11pm but had we experienced another delay - could have been a real problem.</p>
<p>Another tip: Have more than 1 person read the email that comes with directions for the audition. This one was definitely my fault. We set up a “college only” email account and S received directions for the audition that he told me to go ahead and print. I did so but did not read closely enough and misread the actual time to arrive at the venue! He caught it while munching on a bagel and oj the morning of the audition - we had to RUN literally. Luckily he knew his way around and we arrived in plenty of time but would have been much less stressful had we both read it - he most likely would have caught the time difference (this is what happens when you skim!)</p>
<p>OK - that’s it for now
Good luck everyone!</p>
<p>This is a great thread and glad to see it rise to the top again. Glad things worked out for you, squiggles!</p>