@Medea1 you can call the schools about the time limit. Back in the day, we called and asked if they would prefer we cue the best parts and they suggested 3 minutes (Harvard). I don’t think that they listened to much more than that! I am not even sure faculty listened. Admissions may have just gone by the resume. So I would call and not stress about this.
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Does anyone know who typically reviews the prescreens? Is it the admissions officers, department head, or individual instrument teachers? I’m assuming it’s just a quick cursory review, and they don’t watch the entire length of the videos.
For audition-based music programs, the individual instrument teachers will review the prescreen submissions. My experience is based on classical instrumental music. It is hard to know how much or what part of each prescreen they listen to. It is doubtful that they listen to the entire submission.
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I know that for some instruments (like voice), where there are multiple teachers, a panel listens to the prescreens.
This is opinion and a general comment: my understanding is that the prescreens are not listened to fully (even in the professional world this has been shown through technology that shows how much a submitted prescreen is watched in the opera world…to the dismay of the vocalists…sometimes for 5 or 10 seconds!). The advice we got was be sure to have a strong start bc that may be all the panel/teacher needs to pass you to audition. I’ve heard that for voice they can know within the first 15 to 30 seconds if you are a fit for their program.
Further up thread, a parent asked if a “performance” type prescreen would be better than a kid alone in a room. Again my opinion but the prescreen is simple…are you up to snuff for the school. I think that they would prefer the “down and dirty” simple prescreen bc that’s all they need. Also it evens the playing field. They are simply doing a pass/fail at this point.
Of course, there could always be a case where a prescreen is more important…but my understanding is that it is pretty cut and dry. The AUDITION is where they will really look at your talent and performance skills.
And, dare I say, these are very busy professionals. They may not be “analyzing” the hard work of your kid’s prescreen much. You can agonize over it…for a teacher or panel to watch less than a minute. This may be all they need at this point (they have been doing this for years in an efficient manner so I doubt there is a lot of time or debate for the majority of prescreens). Still you should approach the prescreen as they will watch ALL of it…just in case.
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My DD 22 is a VP (soprano) CIM and CWRU English dual degree grad. Class of 2024. Happy to answer any questions - DM me. I am glad she got out when she did, but I have many good things to say about CIM. She was involved with the Case Observer and that did keep her busy and probably draw her into more of the drama than I’d have liked. She is at USC now pursuing her MM and is enjoying less drama there. My biggest grievance is the additional $10k/year CIM/CWRU will charge for dual degree. They are so unorganized and it was hard for mine to complete all requirements because the 2 organizations don’t really communicate. For the additional admin cost, you would expect it to be a little more figured out. That said, mine did get both done in 4 years and I think it was a quality education all around.
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Just an FYI if anyone else is applying to UMiami Frost EA (due 11/1). My son logged on to his portal today to upload his prescreen videos and it populated 2 more essays to write. I’m not sure how he missed them before, but now he is scrambling to get those done too.
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We found out the same thing this week about UMiami’s essays! So hard to keep up!
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Hi All,
I’ve mostly been a lurker but thought I’d join this thread to keep track of how everyone is doing and how the process is going throughout the year. We’re in Texas, and my daughter is a senior who is planning to be a vocal performance major (mezzo-soprano). We visited several schools last fall (Juilliard, MSM, Eastman, Curtis) and several more over the summer (CIM, Oberlin, IU). She’s planning to apply for all of those plus UNT (her only “safety,” but she really wants to leave Texas for school) and Carnegie Mellon.
She is currently working on applications and sample lessons at the various schools. She’s already had lessons at Eastman, Oberlin, CIM, Juilliard, and IU, and has one set up with a teacher at UNT in a couple of weeks. She has found several teachers she likes and feels would be a good fit, but she still needs to find people to contact at MSM and CM for sample lessons at those schools, so if anyone has any experience there, we’d love suggestions!
I followed the Acceptances/Scholarships thread religiously last year to try to get a feel for which schools were being generous with merit, etc, and it was an incredible resource! We’re definitely chasing merit to some extent because we fall into that income range where we won’t qualify for need-based aid but definitely can’t pay full sticker price. She was a finalist at the CS Music competition last spring and was awarded scholarships to several schools, so we know she will have at least a few good options with decent financial packages, but it’s always nice to have more options 
I’m looking forward to getting to know everyone and following the journeys of these talented kids!
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I have a current VP freshman daughter at IU Jacobs (also a mezzo:) who is having a great experience so far. My oldest daughter (soprano) also attended Jacobs and graduated with her bachelors and masters. Feel free to reach out if you have questions—profs, ensembles, performance opportunities, scholarships, etc. Best of luck to your daughter on her search!
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Those applying to IU, there is no additional essay, right? When my other child applied, there was “why me” essay. We can’t find one now.
Yes, so if you send in a YouTube upload link instead of a video file, you can actually check in the Analytics the exact length someone has viewed the video. One of my kid’s prescreen videos had 2 views at the time of submission last week. One view was me (watched the whole 2 minutes and 30 seconds). The other view is my kid’s lesson teacher and I can tell the teacher watched for 1 minute and 50 seconds. No one else has the link and I doubt his teacher will be watching again. So I will be able to tell exactly how long the prescreener listened when they do… Just saying.
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@reshammendi my post about submitting a music supplement, where I expressed doubt about who listened to the submission, pertained only to a BA application with supplement, not a prescreen for a BM.
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How do you do that? I would love to be able to see that.
This link explains how to use YouTube analytics
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My son had an additional essay on the IU application for Jacobs. It was pretty open ended about experience, goals, music you like, etc. 500 words I think
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I feel like there was one last year. Not in the general IU app but in the separate Jacobs app.
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I have this (below) in our spreadsheet. I don’t know where we found it, and I can’t find it now. But our expectation is that we’ll see this question in the Jacobs app (it wasn’t in the Common App). Hoping my son will submit to IU today so we should get access to the Jacobs app soon to confirm.
“With your answers above, we have learned a lot about your training and performance background. Now, in a short essay (500-700 words), please tell us more about yourself. Please tell us about your interests outside of school, music, or dance, and please include any thoughts on your life journey, what challenges you have encountered, and how your local community, your family and friends have impacted you as a student, musician, or dancer. We would love to hear about what music you enjoy listening to and please tell us about your thoughts on the future, your career path, and the contributions you wish to make in the world of art, music, and dance. (* required)”
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You can start your jacobs application with a guest account. Do not wait for some link after applying to IU because it wont come
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Thank you! I didn’t realize he could do that already. I thought we had to wait for an email invite after applying to IU.
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Your Channel => Manage Videos => Click on Title of the Video => Analytics (left menu bar) => Click on See More right under the graph
I was able to check that someone viewed all 4 of the prescreenings yesterday. Had to wait until this morning to view the granular data to populate: of the 4 tunes, they listed to 2 tunes in full, 1 about 80% and the 5 minute ballad, they listened 50%.
(I used to have a YouTube Channel ^^;.)
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