comp12

CUNY Graduate Center has sent out a email to composition applicants this afternoon, asking to schedule in-person or phone interviews on February 4th.

If we are thinking of the same person - this is a prof. who has a particularly well known twitter account and following. All he basically said, was just light-heartedly reminding people something on the lines of "if submitting a data cd, make sure your files are actually on it!"

My Columbia DMA app has updated that PDF as well.

Welcome to the grad cafe, Cece! What schools are you looking at?

Well, there's no doubt that faculty exchange notes on their applicants with their colleagues at other universities. The music academia world is so small, that everybody knows everybody, that the topic of applicants and recruiting will naturally come up during everyday conversation. Schools have limited funds available, so they have to be strategic when offering their places. I don't think I'm cynical enough to believe that schools will deliberately reject qualified candidates in order to make them more accurate in their yield predictions, but who knows? Now, judging from past survey responses here at Gradcafe - obviously it's true that the institutions have their own internal waitlist process, which means they accept the ones they really want early, and if they hear back a No, they move on to the next person, before ultimately sending out a mass official rejection towards their officially promised dates of mid/late March. That's why, I agree, that waiting blows! Good luck all! At this point, it's all out of our hands, so sit back and here's to hoping it turns out well for everyone!

I agree it would be lame indeed if we were required to fly out to interview. However, that's what performance applicants do for their auditions. And they're not expected to receive any travel aid, 99% of the time. But on the other hand, at least in their field, the audition is understood to be part of the process, and is clearly laid out as a requirement from the start. In musicology, I suppose it is more ambiguous.

Happy birthday Maestro Herbert!

Do departments fly out their applicants to these interviews, or are they required to do so on their own? Does anybody know if CUNY interviews for comp?

Happy 2012 everyone! May this be the year we are become doctoral students! Does anyone know when schools begin inviting applicants for interviews?

Chrisp, I also applied for a couple of the schools as you - UCSD and Harvard. Good luck to the both of us

Good luck, chrisp! What are some of the schools you have your sights on?

Congrats and best of luck Becca! How many did you end up applying to in the end?

Has anybody reading this ever applied / is applying to McGill? It's asking my referees to email letter directly to admissions (odd) and also nothing is updating on my MINERVA tracking page.

snes - I'm curious about Temple. What about the program attracts you? I'm considering it myself as well (though for DMA composition instead of musicology)

I will have a Masters. (But since I'm in composition, a not a more research oriented field like the "-ology's", haha, our credentials matter way less than our portfolio. Temple has a strong music performance and music education program, so I would think as a theorist there, it shouldn't be too bad an environment.

No I believe Skype interviews are quite common actually.

I don't know, but it is a pretty competitive school for composition. Maybe see if their website has a list of grad students and write them privately to ask how the funding is? Good luck!

For applicants to PhD/DMA programs, particularly those in composition, do you think one will gain an advantage by visiting the department and meeting faculty in person at some point during the Fall? Why or why not?

UMKC should be a great place to study composition with Chen Yi there.

To last year's applicants: congrats on your acceptances and good luck with beginning your new careers in the upcoming weeks. Did any of you choose to visit the schools in person (if it weren't required as part of an audition/interview process), and do you think it was helpful to meet with prospective faculty personally?

Oh whoops did my noob'ness show through? I meant to put this thread in the Music forum - that's what it seems I did...?

Ok, I think it's high time we get this upcoming admissions season started! I'll be doing PhD/DMA in composition myself. Don't know where yet, but probably will include perennial favorites Princeton, NYU GSAS and the like.