Applying to a Summer Programme

A summer programme application looks like a single task. It is not. A conservatory preparation programme asks you to open a file, pay a fee, choose repertoire, record videos, alert two people who will write about you, and then wait for a date before you learn whether anyone will hear you play in person. If you are a high-school cellist working through this for the first time, or a parent watching a kitchen table fill up with forms, the order of operations matters as much as the playing does. This walk-through follows the pieces one by one, so you know what is asked, when it is due, and which parts you can prepare long before a deadline arrives.

What the application actually asks you to submit

Start with the core file. The apply page at the Cleveland Institute of Music lists what every applicant provides, undergraduate or graduate: the application itself, a performance resume, an essay, a recorded introduction, transcripts, and two confidential recommendation letters.

The performance resume is not a school transcript in disguise. The page describes it as education, activities, organisations, competitions, masterclasses and any other experience that would strengthen your case. For a violist who has played three years in a youth orchestra and one summer quartet, that is four honest lines. Leave the padding out.

The essay runs 250 to 500 words, double spaced, and answers a question some applicants find harder than any scale: what a successful career in classical music looks like to you, what your goals are, and how the school helps you reach them. That is a written answer, not a performance. Write it the way you would explain yourself to a teacher you respect.

Why does the fee go up overnight?

The application fee is $125, submitted online with the application, and it is nonrefundable. At 12:00am on December 2 it rises to $175. That single fact changes how you plan a December: a fee paid on November 30 costs fifty dollars less than the same fee paid two days later.

Applicants who are first-time freshmen or undergraduate transfers may be eligible for a fee waiver, requested through the application portal and handled under national fee waiver guidelines. The page also notes that a letter on your behalf from a high school principal, counsellor, financial aid officer or community leader can support the request. None of this is automatic. You indicate your intention first, then complete the steps.

Building the video before the deadline hurts

Every applicant records a one-minute introduction inside the application system. You state your full name, your area or areas of study, the degree you are seeking, and your answer to the same question the essay asks. You may re-record as many times as you need. The page recommends leaving ample time to test and complete the recording.

The technical limits are worth reading twice, because they are easy to trip over. You need a computer with video and audio capability and a supported browser, Chrome or Firefox, or an Android phone. The video introduction is not currently supported on iPhones or iPads. A household where the only camera is an iPhone is a household that needs a plan B.

Which areas must send prescreening videos?

Prescreening is not uniform. The page lists the areas that must upload prescreening videos with the application: cello, clarinet, composition, double bass, flute, guitar, horn, oboe, orchestral conducting, organ, piano, timpani and percussion for graduate applicants only, trumpet, viola, violin and voice. All doctor of musical arts and artist diploma applicants must submit prescreening videos as well. If your area does not have prescreening requirements, you submit at least 30 minutes of audition repertoire instead.

Repertoire for prescreening and for the live audition may differ, so the two lists are not interchangeable. Read the requirements for your own instrument rather than copying a friend's choices.

Who writes about you, and what they are asked to say

Two confidential recommendation letters are due by January 15. They must come from people unrelated to you who are qualified to speak to your strengths and weaknesses as a musician. In the application you provide their names and email addresses, so ask early and ask clearly. A teacher who agrees in December and receives the request on January 10 has one week to write.

Transcripts follow the same January 15 date. Both official and unofficial transcripts are acceptable during the application process, uploaded to the application or sent by post to the admission office in Cleveland. Each transcript must list courses year by year with the grades or marks received, the grading scale of the institution, and a graduation date, projected or conferred. If your grades are not yet posted, you send a transcript showing coursework in progress. That rule applies to homeschooled applicants too, who should also check their state's graduation requirements, since each homeschool transcript is evaluated on that basis.

What happens between the deadline and the audition

Applicants to the Young Artist Program, the Bachelor of Music, the Artist Certificate, the Master of Music and the Doctor of Musical Arts take an online theory examination after prescreening decisions are released in late December. That exam is due February 1. Doctor of Musical Arts applicants also sit diagnostic exams in theory and history.

For transfer applicants, the class status is determined by the audition, the transcripts and admission examinations. Theory and ear-training exams are administered online before February 1, and piano proficiency is evaluated for class placement during orientation week before classes begin.

Standardised tests work differently here than at many universities. The school is fully test-optional for SAT and ACT scores, and undergraduate applicants who have taken the exams are encouraged to send them. Homeschooled applicants are strongly advised to submit them. Test reports must be uploaded separately to the application even when they already appear on a school transcript.

Whose calendar you are actually working to

Dates set the tempo for everything above. For Fall 2027 entry, the application opens on September 1, 2026. The application and prescreening video deadline is December 1, 2026, with the fee rising at midnight the next day. In-person auditions fall on February 7, 14, 21 and 28, 2027. Admission decisions and scholarship awards are announced in late March 2027. Graduate applicants have until April 15, 2027 to decide, undergraduate applicants until May 1, 2027.

Spring entry runs on a different clock: the deadline is October 1. A student weighing a spring start against a fall start is weighing two entirely separate calendars, and the page does not publish which programmes accept spring applicants, so that question belongs in an email to the admission office.

One small but useful detail: the page states that the fee is $125 and that the school does not want the fee to be the reason an applicant takes the programme off a list. If that sentence describes your situation, the waiver process is the next thing to open, not the repertoire list. The dates you already hold are the ones to put on a wall.