Graduate School Admission Results

Rejected - as expected, since we didn't hear a thing until now.rnrn"DearE],rnrnThe Graduate Admissions Committee of the Department of Music has reviewed your application for admission to our graduate program. I regret to report that the department did not admit you to the program.rnrnAs I am sure you know, the number of applicants for graduate study far exceeds the number of those whom we can admit: Each year many strong candidates in all fields must be turned down. I can only assure you that the evaluations and decisions were made with care by our faculty.rnrnWe wish you the best of luck in reaching your academic and musical goals."rnrnThanks, fam. Would love my $125 back of course, but in some ways this generic email was priceless :')

Short, generic rejection email

Waitlisted at my top choice, not mad. Someone deny acceptance please :P

Had prior support from a faculty member to join their studio, so definitely a very competitive year.

DMA (not PhD). I received a pleasant email from the graduate chair. No funding offers yet but they said the first round should go out in mid March.

2a / 1w / 6r / 6p

2a / 1w / 6r / 6p

Regarding not accepting composers this application cycle. To lift the veil and explain how/why: the music dept was given 4 spots by GSAS to accept new grad students across all the grad programs at the music department (5 departments). They also aren't told how many spots/how much funding is available until they start to review applications. It sucks but the faculty don't get any say in how many spots they can have for the entire dept. But with this shortage (only 4 spots), this means that there was a chance one, or more, of these accepted would have been composers into the composition department or, as happened, none accepted at all. Usually they are given more open spots for all the music dept but unfortunately that didn't happen this year. Partly because they are trying to support current students and students who have no funding opportunities elsewhere due to COVID (so even those who have recently graduated). It's not decided until all applicants have been reviewed for all the departments exactly how many of these spots will go to each department. All departments have to negotiate and it was particularly tough this year. This is why it's pretty fluid how many candidates get accepted each year, though usually the composition department, in previous years, usually ends up only accepting 1 or 2 grad students. It ended up that there were really strong candidates and these spots when to the CPCI (interdisciplinary music makers), music theory, and the rest but not composition. It sucks but hopefully this helps illuminate any questions.

No interview. E-mail to check the portal.

Received an email on January 18 to check the online portal, but the message went to my spam folder so I wasn't aware until yesterday 😭😭

DMA

DMA

DMA - They made all applicants take a 3 hour exam (based on 100 pages of readings) last Saturday, before prescreening results were even announced.

DMA - Accepted with fellowship. Ecstatic!