classicalbk

So I'm cruising a school that look amazing on the website - well-planned program, qualified teachers with impressive credentials, cute costumes, etc. Then I hop over to youtube to see what I can see....and I find myself in distress because I really wanted it to be a great school. I know the videos are by somebody's mom with her cell phone, so the sound quality isn't great, but why is the piano so loud and in need of tuning? Why are the singers planted there like trees? Why did the singer pick a showcase song that has all of a 5 note range and not at all suited to her type? Why does the college senior year singer sound no better than some senior high school kids I know locally? Why is the ensemble standing around looking awkward, not knowing what to do with their hands?

Do we eliminate schools based on youtube video performances?

To be fair moms with telephone videos from other schools have managed to impress me with their postings. So we can't blame it all on the video phones. And certainly not on the moms!

Live performances would be great, however, kido has her own rehearsals and performances to deal with.

Is it fair to judge a school by the youtube videos?

Advise (verb). Please.

nicksmtmom

Actually, I was never smart enough to check out YouTube for the "feel" of a program...I think you made some pretty profound observations. Soundwise, yes, that could be forgiven (or at least expectations can be dialed down in that area). And no tape EVER captures the true electricity of a live performance. BUT...the camera can't lie on the other things you noticed: dead arms, lack of reaction from the chorus, the poor choice of song, etc.

When my son was auditioning, we made sure he saw a production by each school's MT department, even if we had to come back another day to do so. Campus tours, fancy housing, etc. (even "buzz" and reputation) are all well and good, but he was most interested to see what their level of production and what level their performers had achieved.

IMHO, I don't think anyone should choose a school without doing this kind of homework.

soozievt

We did not check out YouTube when looking into college programs.

I can also say that my D's BFA program doesn't have any YouTube clips of their productions. In fact, videos typically are not allowed in at their productions. Sadly, we don't even own videos of the musicals D was in at college for the most part.

I notice some colleges put a slew of videos up on YouTube and some like my D's school do not. So, it is a little hard to compare apples to apples relying on YouTube.

nicksmtmom

Soozie
I don't get the feeling that this was a professional video posted by the program. This could be sort of "contraband" and there are lots of those out there...

NJTheatreMOM

I saw some nice videos clips on Youtube of the special performances that NYU/Tisch MT students put on at the beginning of each year for (I think) the entire student body.

They were impressive.

catherine94

Are you applying to a conservatory/specific music program? If not, I wouldn't be concerned. But if you are, phone videos are crummy. My phone makes things sound out of tune. Was it a real performance, or just a dress rehearsal or something of the sort?

Rather than watching youtube videos, see if you can visit the college and watch a performance. That will be so much better than watching cell phone videos on your computer. If you can't visit, maybe the college will send you a DVD of one of their performances.

soozievt

NJTheatreMom, I know what video you mean and the reason that video exists is that this was not a Tisch production. It was at Madison Square Garden. The cast are NYU students (you don't have to necessarily be in Tisch to be in the cast, though most are). They are not all MT students whatsoever but many are from various acting studios. Many are in ETW studio in fact. ALL those in the cast WROTE the show each year. I know this as my D has been in it (the videos you likely watched) and was the musical director of it in 2008 (also a writer/performer) and 2009, and then this month, she was a writer/performer and musical director of a different version that was put on at NYU Abu Dhabi. The latter cast were all Tisch alums.

The videos you speak about (NYU Reality Show) are not a professionally made video (nor posted by NYU) and seem to be from someone in the audience's own camera. While it may reveal talent at Tisch, it is not a MT production by Tisch or by the BFA in MT program. None of the Tisch or MT productions are on YouTube.

PS, just want to mention, having seen the show live at Madison Square Garden in 2008, what really impressed me is that each person in the cast wrote sketches, monologues, and songs and so had to have that talent as well as to sing, act, and dance. The show is very clever and creative as it addresses many serious issues of college life, but in such an entertaining way. So, that was what is striking to me but what you would not know by simply watching a YouTube video. It is a paid job for them to create this show all summer.

classicalbk

I was looking at less competitive schools, trying to find a few to add to the mix that have certain desired characteristics. The videos seemed to be performances, not dress rehearsals, from the look of the crowds.

alwaysamom

classicalbk, I think you can use it as one component of the many that you will weigh in this process. I remember a couple of years ago seeing some youtube videos of performances at a university that is often discussed here on CC and cringing as I watched them. I'm not sure how representative they were of the school as a whole but the performances certainly weren't something that I would have posted if I were a representative of the school.

As an aside, I often wonder about things I see on youtube, though. Earlier today a family friend who is an actor and who was in Rent for a long time sent me a link to a youtube video of a performance of a song from Rent that was done at the Florida Thespians event. It was painful to watch, truly painful, not only because it was so awful but also because the young woman in the video clearly thinks that she has some talent and no one has had the heart or courage to tell her otherwise.

soozievt

While not exactly the original topic of the thread, I'll just make a comment about YouTube. This whole YouTube phenomena has grown in just the last few years. For example, back when my kids were in high school, my theater kid had NOTHING posted on YouTube, even though I think there are some great performances from that time period, including from her summer theater program (I can say this as a biased mom of course). Never posted a thing of this sort online though.

Then, came college BFA program productions and also professional shows. The majority of these did not allow any videotaping of the productions. I think the only thing my kid had on YouTube during the college years were GROUP videos of her college a capella group (some posted by us but many were posted by others). That was it.

It was only close to or AFTER college graduation, that she considered putting anything on YouTube. Even so, she would never allow us to put up any of her shows from prior to her BFA training. She really only wanted professional level work on YouTube.

She's been out of college now for 17 months and now she does have some things on YouTube (though nothing from full scale musical productions as videos are not allowed to be taken). She is a singer/songwriter as well and so has a couple of original stuff online from concerts and such or else college and professional showcases type events. Sometimes others put up videos of her (not us) such as I found one online the last couple of days from a concert she sang in NYC a few nights prior that the venue posted. She's also in an original theater "cabaret" group and they have a few things online that the group posted. She recently made a music video, her first ever, with this group, of a song she wrote (music/lyrics) and is the lead performer in. It's been up for 13 days and has over 12,000 views already and in the past couple of days has been featured on some significant internet sites.

But at this point in her life, having samples online can be a positive thing for a career, whereas she did not have youth or educational production videos online. Remember, when you put your performance talents online, it is there forever, and you want to make sure it represents you well. Also, when you are in the field, people will google your name. Without getting into detail, for example, my D is involved in some important networking at the moment and I am sure these professional people are gonna google her name to see what they can find out. And even the music video that recently was put on YouTube, now that it was featured on some major websites in the last day or two, I'm seeing people comment on OTHER videos my kid is in and saying they found the video having seen the music video featured on these major sites.

So, the point is.....one, is you may wish to wait until you are on the professional level before putting much of your talent on YouTube, and two, once you are professional, it may be a good thing to have samples online, but know that people will google around and find the rest or when you are out there networking, they'll look you up. Make sure you have good samples online and not the stuff you did prior to significant training. For a while, I used to think, gosh, my kid has nothing on YouTube and also we were not allowed to video any of her college musicals or any professional ones and she'd never want us to put up show samples from prior to that time (even if they seem good for her age at the time), but in a way, I'm glad she waited to post anything. She still doesn't have much to put on YouTube because most professional productions do not allow videotaping. She did a national tour that let us video it for personal use but we would not dare put that online. Otherwise, what she mostly can put up are original songs or concert type things.

I know this was not the original question but it relates. YouTube can be fun but as someone who is trying to become a professional performing artist, be careful what you have on YouTube that represents you as it is there for a long time. Before becoming professional, you can share samples with friends of your shows but if you put them on YouTube, that will represent you to the public for a long time, even after your skill level improves.

soozievt

PS....I can think of another example......last spring, a musical that my daughter wrote was workshopped and was being cast by one of the major casting agencies in NYC. As it was a workshop, they were not bringing the actors in for live auditions, but rather the casting agent, after seeing the character breakdowns my D provided them, came up with about 100 different actors (some for various roles) from their roster of known actors (a great many were on Broadway....many very big names and some other professionals not known as widely) and sent them to my daughter for review to see if she could give input and help to narrow the list. Now, my D recognized a lot of the names as they were famous and she also has followed MT her whole life and sees a great deal of theater and knew who many of these people are and is aware of their talents. But there were some on the list she did not know. She was pressed for time and asked me if I could get my hands on anything on these actors. So, I googled them (many had a website) and also looked each one up on YouTube and sent her links to the samples. It was quite an experience actually. But it seemed interesting to me as she only could go by their video samples online (unless she had seen them live in NYC) and in a few cases, I think was at the mercy of the fact that the samples posted didn't necessarily show the full range of particular actors, but that was all she had to go by in some cases to send back her recommendations to the casting agency which went back and forth and back and forth, and when some offers were not accepted, it went back and forth more (I really got an inside look on the whole casting thing!). Anyway, this was an instance, where even for these professional actors, their samples online were being viewed in terms of casting decisions!! Granted, their names were known to the casting agency due to their work in the field, but as my D was a significant part of the casting decision making (as the writer), she had to rely on online samples in some cases. So, it really brought home the idea that one should think about what they have online or on YouTube that represents them! You never know who is viewing it and for what purpose!

classicalbk

Soozievt- A hearty amen to that!

soozievt

Well, I don't recall viewing YouTube in selecting colleges at all, but when reading this thread, the topic of YouTube has been on my mind this week as I observe this music video of my daughter's that has been posted less than two weeks and in fact, I see it has 13,500 views already and I am aware that it is climbing fast the past few days after some websites featured it. The whole thing is rather mind boggling. It is a whole area that is new-ish for performers, but again, some colleges absolutely don't post videos of their productions (including my D's college) and you do have to think about if you want stuff up there of yourself before you had professional training so to speak as look how many people are looking at it. Rather blows my mind.

KatMT

As SoozeVT mentions up thread... Generally speaking it is against copyright law to post videos of productions (sometimes you may be granted permission to make an archival copy of a show... but this would not cover posting on the internet). The exception would be material in the public domain... ie. Gilbert & Sullivan, Mozart, etc... or original material where the composer, playwright, director & choreographer (if union), etc... granted permission for the material to be posted.

This is why often the clips you can find on youtube are questionable quality... someone's mom with a flip camera ...

Of course there are many clips of shows and performances, class work, etc... to be found on the web. I agree with alwaysamom "I think you can use it as one component of the many that you will weigh in this process." I guess I would probably value more the visits to the schools, seeing live productions, sitting in on classes, talking to faculty and students, etc... but, the youtube clips are certainly fun to watch! I think they live in the go with your gut category.

onstage

A classmate of my D's -- a recent grad of Syracuse -- was cast in the B'way production of West Side Story as a direct result of a YouTube clip. Someone involved in casting -- either the choreographer or casting director -- came across a clip of this boy dancing, and called him in for an audition. So you never know!