Audition requirements

Performance of three contrasting pieces of your choice. Choose pieces that would be considered a medium to high level of difficulty.

Performance of three contrasting pieces of your choice. Choose pieces that would be considered a medium to high level of difficulty.

Through your repertoire selections you will need to demonstrate an interest in a range of mainstream contemporary singing styles with style-related licks, riffs and runs (this can include Pop, Rock, RnB, Soul, Hip Hop rap and Country).

Your audition repertoire choices should be contrasting in terms of style, tempo and mood.

Two of your repertoire selections should be cover songs in your preferred primary musical style. Your third repertoire selection can be an original or a cover of any other style. Choose songs that would be considered a medium to high level of difficulty. Avoid songs with a limited range or too much repetition in the melodic line.

The following is a list of examples only:

• RnB: Before Irreplaceable/Halo (Beyonce), Sledgehammer (Rhianna), Superpowers (Daniel Caesar), Treasure (Bruno Mars)
• Pop: Anti Hero (Taylor Swift), Drunk/Perfect (Ed Sheeran), Used To Be Young (Miley Cyrus), Adore You (Harry Styles), My Future (Billie Eilish)
• Hip Hop: Good As Hell/Cuz I Love You (Lizzo), Treehouse (Token), Stressed Out (Twenty One Pilots)
• Rock: Believer (Imagine Dragons), Uprising/Unintended (Muse), Misery Business (Paramore)
• Indie/Folk: Evergreen (Yebba), Rises The Moon (Liana Flores), As The World Caves In (Matt Maltese)
• Jazz/Blues: Nina Simone ("Feeling Good"), Etta James ("At Last"), Louis Armstrong ("What A Wonderful World"), Norah Jones ("Don't Know Why")
• Soul/Neo-Soul: Aretha Franklin ("Respect"), Beyoncé ("Love On Top"), Jill Scott ("A Long Walk"), John Legend ("Ordinary People")
• Electronic/Dance: David Guetta ft. Sia ("Titanium"), Dua Lipa ("Levitating"), Swedish House Mafia ("Don't You Worry Child"), Zedd & Alessia Cara ("Stay")
• Classic Rock: Eagles ("Hotel California"), Aerosmith ("Dream On"), Led Zeppelin ("Stairway to Heaven"), Fleetwood Mac ("Go Your Own Way")
• Reggae: Bob Marley ("Three Little Birds"), UB40 ("Red Red Wine"), Inner Circle ("Bad Boys"), Shaggy ("Angel").

You are welcome to bring along an accompanist. Our audition room is equipped with a grand piano and guitar amps for you or your accompanist to use.  Alternatively, backing tracks are fine. A PA system will be provided and for your backing tracks, a headphone jack connection to the PA system will be available. Please ensure your tracks are prepared in advance and compatible with this setup.

Portfolio submissions should comprise:

• Original music you have created yourself as high-quality mp3, wav or aiff files (maximum file size 300 MB ) Please submit no more than 15 minutes of audio overall.
• Digital video(s) of you performing an instrument and/or demonstrating your current approach to music-making in a home studio or software/computer-based scenario. Please submit no more than eight minutes of video overall.

During your interview, you may be asked about the pieces of your portfolio, points around your artistic statement, or your background in relation to other elements of your music-making (instrument etc.).

Portfolio submissions should comprise:

• audio recordings in mp3 format of three recent compositions of contrasting medium (such as solo instrument, chamber or orchestral or band and vocal/choral or electronic),
• PDF copies of the scores corresponding to the audio recordings.

During your interview, you may be asked about the pieces of your portfolio, points around your artistic statement, or your background in relation to other elements of your music-making (instrument etc.).

Portfolio submissions should comprise:

• Three original songs as high-quality mp3, wav or aiff files (maximum file size 300 MB). Include Word or PDF lyric sheets where relevant.
• Digital video of you demonstrating your current approach to songwriting. You can be creative with how you present this: it could be a screen capture of you breaking down a DAW multi-track session of one of your songs; an except of you refining a new idea and demonstrating the before and after; performing one your songs live to camera (e.g. if you are a singer songwriter) and then breaking down your creative/songwriting choices. Please submit no more than eight minutes of video overall.

During your interview, you may be asked about the pieces of your portfolio, points around your artistic statement, or your background in relation to other elements of your music-making (instrument etc.).

Your contrasting pieces should include at least one from the standard jazz repertoire below. At least one of these should demonstrate an ability to improvise over a common jazz form such as blues or a 32-bar standard tune. Not all pieces will necessarily be heard in their entirety. Audition repertoire can be contrasting in terms of tempo and mood; style (swing, bossa nova, samba, ballad, funk); form (blues, 32-bars, other lengths); and tonality (major, minor, blues).

Suggested jazz repertoire:

• Blues: Now's the Time, C-Jam Blues, Centrepiece, Sonnymoon for Two.
• Bossa Nova: Black Orpheus, Blue Bossa, The Gentle Rain, Recorda-Me, Perdido, or any composition by Antonio Carlos Jobim.
• Standards: Autumn Leaves, Summertime, Beautiful Love, God Bless the Child, Stormy Weather, Misty, Take the ‘A’ Train, or any standard by Porter, Gershwin, Berlin, Schwartz, Rodgers, Ellington, Arlen or Kern. *Drummers: may include a snare drum study as one of the pieces.
• Saxophonists: may include an etude (for example, by Lennie Niehaus, Jim Snidero) as one of the pieces.
• Pianists: may include a transcription (for example, by Dave Brubeck, Oscar Peterson, Bill Evans) as one of the pieces.

Through your repertoire selections you will need to demonstrate an interest in improvising in a jazz style. You may be asked to solo over a blues form.

Audition repertoire choices should be contrasting in terms of tempo, mood, style (for example, a selection from swing, bossa nova, samba, ballad, funk) and form (blues, 32-bars, other lengths). At least two of your repertoire selections should be jazz standards and include at least one from the repertoire suggestions below. One should be performed in swing style. A jazz standard is virtually any song by Gershwin, Porter, Berlin, Rodgers, Arlen, Schwartz or Ellington performed in the style of noted jazz artists such as Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday, Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Nat King Cole and Kurt Elling.

Through your selection, you will need to demonstrate an interest in improvising in a jazz style. You may be asked to solo over a blues form.

For example:

• Blues: Stormy Monday, Now's the Time, C-Jam Blues.
• Bossa Nova: Black Orpheus, Blue Bossa, Girl from Ipanema (or any composition by Antonio Carlos Jobim).
• Swing standards: Autumn Leaves, Summertime, Beautiful Love, God Bless the Child, Stormy Weather, Misty, Take the ‘A’ Train; or any standard song by Porter, Gershwin, Berlin, Schwartz, Rodgers, Ellington, Arlen or Kern.

Your third repertoire piece can be in any style. For example, an original composition, a pop, R&B or country song, or a song from a musical theatre show.

Performance of three contrasting pieces of your choice. Choose pieces that would be considered a medium to high level of difficulty.

Submission pieces must include:

• one work for tuned percussion (xylophone, marimba, or vibraphone)
• one piece for timpani (or multiple percussion)
• one piece for snare drum

During a live audition, you will also need to demonstrate technical requirements, such as:

• tuning on timpani
• rudiments on snare drum
• scales on keyboard percussion instruments
• ability to sight-read on any instrument.

Performance of three contrasting pieces of your choice. Choose pieces that would be considered a medium to high level of difficulty.

Submissions should comprise performance of a set work from the following:

• Flute: Louis Drouet⁠—from 25 Studies, No.1 in C Major.
• Oboe: Ferling 48 studies for Oboe Op. 31 (one slow and fast pair in the same key) or two contrasting own choice studies from Hinke Elementary Method for oboe.
• Clarinet: Rose 40 Studies, No.4.
• Bassoon: L. Milde (edited by Simon Kovar) Study #1 from 25 studies in scales and chords Op.24.
• Saxophone: Eugene Bozza – Caprice Etude No.2.

Portfolio submissions should comprise three pieces of your work, ideally relevant to a variety of creative or performative settings.