<p>Based on my experience with all this, most kids going through auditions seem to come out thinking they blew it, it didn’t go well, etc. Music students seem to be some of the most self critical people I have met, which given the level of music these days is not necessarily a bad thing.Also understand that like most things, it seems darkest when you are in the middle of it, the anxiety and everything is magnified. </p>
<p>I have heard a lot of the conventional wisdom surrounding auditions, how there are these cadres of ‘perfect’ kids auditioning, how there is X who won all these competitions and so forth, and therefore unless you are perfect you won’t get in, and a lot of that is frankly, myth in many cases. First of all, even the best players makes mistakes, they are human, and in many cases they probably make the same mistakes you did. More importantly, it is difficult to know what in fact the audition panel is looking for or what constitutes acceptance. From everything I can tell, it involves a lot of things, depending on the school and panel, and it could be that the ‘perfect’ auditionee doesn’t get accepted because they don’t show what the audition panel wants to see. Conversely, I have seen kids who in some ways weren’t the most ‘superior’ players, who got into high level programs and I would hazard a guess it was because they showed the kind of passion and love for the music, showed interpretive skills and unique expression that caught their eye…</p>
<p>If you don’t get in, it isn’t the end of the world. Others had some suggestions, and mine would be that if you don’t get in all the places you auditioned (which I suspect is unlikely, unless your teacher and yourself were totally clueless about the level you were at, which I suspect isn’t the case), then take a gap year to iron out the problems. While they generally don’t give feedback from what I have been told, you may be able to ask the admissions department if it would be possible to get some feedback, to see what the issues were. More importantly, you could try and get evaluations from teachers at the schools or an equivalent level, to see what they think, and then address the issues. </p>
<p>Plus also understand that you may simply have hit a bad year and there were few openings at the top schools and a ton of really incredible candidates. There are times when on a specific instrument few slots or any are open, and often that includes grad and undergrad applicants and it could be luck of the draw. </p>
<p>I wish you luck, hope you are flying high when the answers come back.</p>