You, no doubt, are an excellent student. After all, you’ve been in school all your life. For the first 12 years, you learned all the basics. For the last four to eight, you’ve been specializing, refining your skills, getting some experience. And now, at long last, you’re ready to launch your career.
Or are you?
If you were graduating with a career in law, or business, or education, or just about anything other than the arts, you could go to a career counselor provided by your school. You could get information about job placement. Your school might even provide you with some leads for employment or internships.
But music schools rarely provide this kind of support for performers. If you’re lucky, your opera department has posted audition fliers for Young Artist Programs on a bulletin board, and maybe one of your teachers has made a few phone calls to see about getting you an audition somewhere.
You may or may not have been taught to use Musical America, OPERA America, YAP Tracker, or Classical Singer. You may or may not have any idea which YAPs you should start auditioning for. If you’re very unlucky, you may believe that upon graduation, the thing to do is move to New York and start looking for an agent. You may believe that all you have to do is sing those five arias you’ve devoted so much time to honing well in auditions, and someone from the Met will take you in and make you a big star.
You may laugh, but there are many unfortunate young singers who do believe such things—and many more who are graduating without a very clear sense of what to do next or how to go about doing it. So how do you prepare to launch a singing career? If you’re not graduating right now, what can you do to get ready while you’re still in school?
Most undergraduates and many grad students spend most of their education just trying to master the basics of singing and music. Very few schools offer any kind of training on the business side of being a musician. If they do, it may not be specific to being a singer. You need to acquire this knowledge on your own and, in the meantime, you need to prepare yourself for a performance career in a smart, targeted way.
Top 10 Things to Do before Graduating
In my Business of Singing seminars, I give students the following advice for their career-launch preparation:
Set goals for your study every semester.
Sure, your teacher has a plan for your vocal progress, but you need to have goals of your own. They should be clear cut, and don’t be afraid to discuss them with your teacher and coach to make sure they are realistic. Maybe this is the semester you’re going to learn a full role or a song cycle; do a competition or audition for a program; or translate, research, and study a role you expect to sing in the near future.
It’s nice if you can incorporate some of this into your other academic work—singing songs from the cycle for your jury, for example, or combining your research with a paper on music history. The important thing is to go beyond the requirements. If it’s all you can do to memorize six or seven songs a semester for your jury, you are not motivated enough for a career in singing.
As soon as you are ready, spend as many of your summers as possible participating in reputable training programs.
Training programs and YAPs offer an intensive, focused experience that you simply can’t get during the school year. The best ones will challenge you, give you unexpected value, teach you about yourself as a person and a musician. You will make lifelong contacts and friends. They are an invaluable way to bring you along by leaps and bounds, if you choose a program that is right for you and if you work very hard.
Sing or at least learn full roles, song cycles, and symphonic works.
Our industry is increasingly youth oriented, and there is a relatively small window of opportunity for young singers to get their careers off the ground by traditional means (competitions, Young Artist Programs). The field is extremely competitive. It is a mistake to graduate without ever having learned, if not sung, a single full role.
By full roles, I don’t necessarily mean Violetta, Ulrica, Calaf, or Figaro—especially if you’re not ready for them. But any young singer can and should learn comprimario roles in his or her Fach. Very few of us are hired to sing leading roles right out of school. Instead (or at least, in addition), learn roles that will get your foot in the door with opera companies, choruses, and symphonies. Even if you’re not ready to sing an opera role, you can learn a Bach cantata or an orchestrated song cycle.
At the end of every school year (or every semester), give yourself, your school, and your teachers a “report card.”
You alone are in charge of your education. If you are not making sufficient progress or getting the knowledge and experience you need, you must correct that before you invest too much valuable time and money. Hold yourself accountable—by setting goals at the beginning of the semester, you can better assess what needs more attention in the coming months.
Do a few reputable competitions.
Competitions can be very expensive gambles. All you are guaranteed when you are accepted to compete is that you will be heard. You may or may not get any useful feedback. You may or may not win. But you will gain auditioning experience. You can check out your competitors, and you may get the attention of someone worth knowing. It’s worth it for young singers to do some well vetted competitions for the experience and a chance at the prizes. Just go in with realistic expectations.
Do a lot of research.
Do you know who the major and minor agents are? Do you know what opera companies, symphonies, choruses, festivals, YAPs, and competitions are in your area? Do you know who the singers are in the major and minor YAPs right now, and who’s winning the competitions?
Do you know who in your town hires soloists? Do you know what the 10 most frequently performed operas and large choral or symphonic works with solos are, and which of these have roles in your Fach? Do you know who is singing the roles you hope to sing in regional companies right now?
Do you know where to find all of this information?
If these questions have never occurred to you, or if you don’t know these answers, one of your major goals for the next semester should be to start educating yourself about your chosen profession. Familiarize yourself not only with this magazine (check back issues—which, hopefully, you can find in your school library or, if you’re a subscriber, you can do a search in the extensive online archives at www.ClassicalSinger.com) but also become very familiar with Musical America Directory, YAP Tracker, OPERA America and its various publications for singers, Opera News, and online sources such as the New Forum for Classical Singers (www.nfcs.net), Operabase, opera company websites, and more.
Make sure your materials are prepared.
You may not have much to put on them yet, but you still need a résumé and biography, in addition to a headshot. You’ll also need a demo CD for many YAP auditions and competitions, as well as for symphony and choral gigs. Now is the time to get started. Don’t use a template—go online and search for other young singers’ websites. (For specific help, check out www.ClassicalSinger.com for archived articles, like my May 2004 “Résumé Basics” or June 2008 “Three Months to a Better Singing Career Part II.”) Don’t try to model your first portfolio on someone famous; pick singers who are two or three steps up the ladder from you. And don’t despair if you have relatively little to list—everyone has to start somewhere. Write down every singing experience you can think of and go from there.
Start a database of industry contacts.
Networking is possibly one of the most important ways musicians get work. It’s never too early to start networking. The people you are in school with right now, the people you meet in YAPs and training programs—one day some of these folks are going to be running opera companies, pay-to-sings, and YAPs; conducting choruses or symphonies; directing university opera programs and teaching voice; composing music; managing artists; or sitting on boards of companies and foundations. Current teachers may end up working in arts administration or have connections from their own performance careers that they might use on your behalf.
When you do a training program or YAP, you will have the opportunity to connect with people from all over the world who can, in turn, help you make that next important connection that may get you a job or put you in touch with your next teacher or agent. (I got my first agent through an introduction from his partner, a coach, at a YAP).
Keep a file of names, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses. Keep in touch with these people informally via Facebook, e-mail, or the occasional postcard. It needn’t be anything fancy. Just let people know what you’re up to and don’t forget to be genuinely interested in them, as well. Asking for favors out of the blue, when you haven’t been in contact, is awkward and difficult. But if you simply stay in touch and let people know what you’re working on, chances are those who feel kindly towards you will volunteer help or, at the very least, will be receptive to requests. And if you still feel intimidated by the idea of networking, just remember that networking is nothing but communicating with people—which you already do, every single day.
Forget the Magic Five Formula—prep your Terrific Twelve!
Young singers struggle to polish their perfect five audition arias and spend a lot of time worrying about getting the formula just right. (German aria? But I’m a lyric mezzo! I don’t really have anything in French! Are five slow Italian pieces okay?) Here’s a little secret for you: The most important thing is to sing what you sing well. Yes, there are specific requirements for competitions, training programs, YAPs, and school auditions. Once you hit the real world, however, nobody cares if you’re missing a French aria or if you offer three Baroque pieces and two Mozart.
As a professional, you should sing what you sing best and make sure you’re auditioning appropriately—in other words, don’t offer Baroque arias to companies that never produce Baroque pieces. And here’s another little secret: you need a lot more than the Magic Five. Shoot for a repertoire of seven to 12 really great arias or excerpts that you keep polished. That way, you’ll always have something appropriate for auditions.
Before you enter the final year of your studies, develop a five-year plan.
When you graduate and find yourself spit out of the education system for the first time in your whole life, it can be pretty overwhelming. Few singers find themselves entering into any kind of structured system (such as a 9-to-5 job). As a professional performer or a teacher unaffiliated with a school, you are starting your own small business, and it’s up to you to provide the structure. Having a basic plan will go a long way toward dispelling the confusion and frustration you may feel in the beginning. And your plan can always evolve!
First, think about your big goals. What are you setting out to achieve? A big, international opera or concert career? A tenured faculty position at a prestigious university that still allows you opportunities to perform? A directorship of a good church choir, performing recitals and concerts around town? By setting these dreams on paper, you are making them concrete and helping to keep yourself accountable.
Next, outline the steps you believe you need to reach those goals. Do you need to apply for a YAP? Research teaching positions? Get some more specific training? Join an organization that can help you network or find job openings? Start auditioning for professional roles? Don’t just sit and think about the first steps. Research the careers of those who have gone before and try to chart their career arcs. Everyone’s path is different, but you can get some ideas of what sorts of things you might need to do.
Consider where you need to live in order to accomplish these goals. Do you need to move to a different city? Is it realistic for you, given your financial and personal situations? You may need to research opportunities, living arrangements, the musical community, and other information about potential cities before making an informed decision about relocating.
Contemplate how you will fund the beginning of your singing career. YAPs usually pay a small stipend, but it won’t be enough to bank or pay off student loans. Entry-level singing jobs are also usually low paid and, in the beginning, may be few and far between. Most singers need some kind of day job that pays the bills while allowing them the energy and time for coachings, auditions, and out-of-town performing.
Attach deadlines to each of your goals and steps. Make each as detailed as you can in terms of what you will do to accomplish each of them. This helps you chart your progress or note why an element of the plan hasn’t succeeded and gives you clues about how to revise it.
It’s not enough to rely on hearsay and speculation. You need to do some research and discover what you can realistically expect. And you need to have backup plans as well, in case things don’t work out quite as you hope. During your last year of study, you can refine your plan and start putting the preliminary parts of it into motion. That way, when you graduate, you will have a strong sense of direction which will help you get the most from your time and effort.
Instead of spinning your wheels, wasting valuable time and other resources, you’ll be making specific progress and getting your career off the ground.
Next month: In Part II of this article, we’ll explore how to continue your young career’s momentum and achieve “Life after Grad School.”
