Scholar Holler Forums

hliu

Does above average musical talent matter to colleges? I know lots of people who were amazing at piano or violin or whatever and ended up going to MSU.

jzhou · Site Admin

Being good at music (and pretty much anything else) is definately a positive for colleges because your talent tells the college that you are able to be committed to one thing and achieve results through hard work and persistence.

The extent to which proficiency at music will help your college admissions depends on things like the rarity of your instrument (colleges may be looking for bassoon players, for example) and how good you are (all-region? all-state? concertmaster?).

With that being said, unless you are applying for a music school like Julliard or Curtis, being able to play music will be regarded much the same as other extracurriculars and secondary still to the academic component.

Now, if you can make something more out of music - more than just playing an instrument, then you will really have something going for you. By this I mean that if you can, say, take leadership positions as President of the Band or employ music in community service by playing for senior citizens then you will be one step ahead.

Remember though that as with everything else, music is something to be enjoyed and having the ability to make beautiful music is a gift so don't look at it as just another factor in college admissions (which I'm sure you aren't doing anyways! Smile

)

ngarg

i'm gonna basically just parrot what john said...playing an instrument is a beautiful thing, and who knows, maybe you're better at math as a result. but what a college will look for is a specific dedication to something, you showing deep PASSION for something, and an instrument can easily fill that niche for you, though there are other outlets (a job, politics, a school group, a sport, etc.). Being a lead clarinetist for the Detroit area is good, joining the orchestra at school your senior year to stick it on your college app...not so good...now that I'm done spouting mostly generic stuff, go have fun playing your instrument (whatever it is) Smile

huy

To answer your question of how much does music matter, try sitting down and writing an essay of how much music means to you. If you feel that you can't write anything more than how long you've played and which awards you've won, then your musical talent probably won't matter much to colleges as anything more than another award from your resume. However, if you can write about a specific experience in which you really found your passion for music or how you built your life around it or something, then that could make all the difference in getting into your college.

I think that it depends how much you emphasize music in your life...even if you're not exceptionally good but have a passion for playing music (and apply it to the community or something), you can still make music important in your application. Music is still an extracurricular that is extremely popular with students around the nation and you have to try to make yourself stand out with either a spectacular achievement (difficult awards/positions) or a good recounting of how it affected you and your life.

hliu

Thanks for the responses. I especially liked the suggestion of writing an essay, huy. With a community like this one, this site can really work out.

Btw, how much did the domain cost?

feng

lol, I hope threads don't get derailed so quickly in the future. Regardless, I'll try to answer those questions.

From my experience, domains usually cost around $10 a year, or something. Shared webhosting ranges from $25 a year to $30 a month, depending on bandwidth, space, quality, and options.

btan

llllll

I live near U of M and heard MSU sucked. Is there a lot of difference between U of M and MSU?

harrison72

in general, U of M is better than MSU in academics. that's not to say that MSU "sucks." some of my friends go there and they are definitely intelligent and active students; for them (speculating here) MSU simply was a good fit perhaps financially (scholarships) or because of a specific program.

but since you live near Ann Arbor, i guess you have a predilection towards U of M Laughing