Life at the Best Music School in the World

hey guys welcome back to another YouTube video as you can see we're standing outside of the Curtis Institute of Music one of the best music schools in the world out of the thousands who audition here every year only a few get accepted as a four percent acceptance rate and only 155 students all of whom are on full tuition scholarship now I tried to audition here twice I didn't get in the first time but on my second attempt when I was 15 years old finally got in was accepted and came to school here so today we're going to do something a little different we managed to get our hands on a Curtis student who has agreed to show us around take us on a little tour and also answer your questions about what life is like at the best music school in the world let's go foreign [Music] excited to introduce to you guys Alexandra Corman second year violinist here at Curtis studying with Ida kavafian hi guys I hope you're doing well I'm so happy to show you around Curtis it's really an amazing place you don't want to take up too much of your time today so we'll get right to it you know we collected a bunch of questions from the community asking about what life is like at Curtis and also a lot of questions around the audition wait how many times did you auditions just once but then I definitely did many other auditions before that just to be really ready out of all the questions that were asked actually one popped out to me which is uh how's the food like at Curtis that's a good question no honestly it's pretty good because you have a lot of choice so you can have and only vegetables and a lot of meat and vegetarian vegan what's a typical day like like did you just come from class just now yes so normally we do have class every day at least for two years it's mandatory classes like keyboard studies course studies so fast you know all those Theory classes and then normally in your third year you're more free to practice to perform you know get concerts so it's a really busy time for your two years oh okay got it so are there like non-musical classes or is it mostly like 80 musical or right so first year normally you have only like those fish Theory classes and then you can have elective classes which are more about uh philosophy uh maths you can have also languages like I'm taking a German class 9 A.M in the morning like four times in a week so that's useful that's useful I took the German class here as well I agree so today it's a weekday and obviously people are in classes there are two buildings right in Curtis there's the old building which we were in right now but then there's also the new building right right the lymphist hall are the classes mostly here or are the lessons here um it's a little the mix of it so we have a few classes here normally the lessons like Mrs kavafian I have always here keyboard studies or Solfege that we have there in the lymphus hall wow well I was just noticing that things have changed around here since I was a student so I I can't wait to take a look around well I'm really curious about seeing what is new here all right let's let's go let's go take a look so what we just passed was the main for you where everybody can meet wow it looks so different from when I was yeah it's brand new yeah there used to be so much glass everywhere and now it's like so much more open I didn't know that yeah yeah so this is the studio where we mainly have lesson for example with Mrs cavachon my teacher so vinyl lessons also chamber music for example with Mr Tenenbaum can we see a practice room definitely yeah all right all right let's go let's go oh you can open it I think so wow oh wow here we go it's a little loud so this one we don't really use a lot I think the building just lost power they call it this the old building for a reason this is considered like not a large practice room right no it's a little bit smaller than than usual exactly so we don't really have classes in here or lessons my favorite are actually in the lenses hall because they're really dry you can hear all the details we're gonna go check out another practice room in here it's like a bigger one right oh my gosh there's even a Cinderella towel here milk of violin artist studio yes I remember practicing in here in a couple times this one's definitely not as boomy this is like the harpsichord room yes you try [Music] would you have classes in here sometimes yes camera music too oh wow is a little bit darker yeah bottom two wait they got rid of the window here oh I I didn't know what happened to the window there's no more window there's an elevator now it's an elevator you have on campus employment right yes if you want you can work a little bit here for example turn P just at the concert or at straw rehearsals to cherries back got it got it oh yeah yeah I was stage crew yeah back then they didn't have elevators I I picked uh moving Parts oh and they paid us per hour per flight of stairs wait is this still the Solfege room upstairs that's a good question I've never been yeah we gotta go take a look where are we this is Amy Yang's room associate dean of piano and artistic initiatives all right let's let's move on let's move on we're outside of the class right now what's going on in there apparently there is a class here I have no idea which one it is but you can see subscribers very focused very focused they probably won't even see you oh my gosh seriously they've seen us they've seen us keep going gotta keep going yeah they're learning the dark arts of Music it feels like I'm in it feels like I'm in Hogwarts oh my gosh I used to have my piano lessons in here really yeah like in there oh except now this is an office wait it seems like that classroom is open maybe I could relive my Curtis my Curtis experience right now I go into class is there a lot's going on right now right you're just early are you a supplemental piano teacher yeah hi I'm Tom waiver I teach uh supplemental piano keyboard studies and core studies the supplementary piano is like the class that all non-pianists have to take right as as part like one or two years two years two years Alexander you're coming up on your second yeah second year you got a jury coming up soon I'm nervous when I was a student I pretended I couldn't play piano even though I had studied it for like seven years but I came in and I just I read every single time how do you feel about that well thanks so much for your time why is the lighting red in there so much scarier I don't know it's very strange it's very strange oh my gosh all right we're gonna go check out a rehearsal that we're inviting ourselves to right now nah just kidding Alex invited us earlier so come check this out this is the Curtis Symphony Orchestra [Music] dang this space is so huge this wasn't here when I was a student I mean look at those Florida ceiling Windows just like check them out this is nice when we were students back at field Concert Hall we could barely fit into that space so I'm here with Elizabeth Randolph she's the orchestra manager for the Curtis Symphony Orchestra and a couple questions how often do the students rehearse so every week is a little bit different because we have so many ensembles going on uh usually in a concert week it's every day in a normal week without a concert two or three times depending what we have going on how long are the rehearsals on for usually two and a half hours added in with all the chamber music rehearsals all the classes and of course the personal practicing that's a full full schedule right it's very long days all of our rehearsals can't start before four because of the academic calendar sometimes we have rehearsals as late as 10 o'clock at night and is it mandatory for all students to be a part of the Curtis Orchestra if there is instrumental students usually yeah it depends on the repertoire and the instrumentation needs so I'm here with pianist Jenny Chen who actually we went to school together yes I was 10 years old and you were 16 years old I'm curious It's like what what do you do now and like you told me that earlier you play for Midori goto Studio yes yes so I uh all Midori students I play for her and I actually recently just performed with her how's that transition been from being a student to now suddenly like staff here yes it's been a lot because you know I graduated at Curtis when I was about 18 years old and then that's when I got into Yale University and also finished my Master's there and did my doctorate degree at Eastman School of Music then I came back to Curtis for the staff pianist position it's so different because I find more value now as a staff pianist that I am devoting to my life to a lot of students who need to go to competition auditions and then I'm I'm trying to support everyone here and then it's it's been a great fun we should do a collab sometimes artists definitely I guess it's break time right it is break time we'll be starting right now with all the modern pieces actually written by composers from Kurt itself wow Curtis composers exactly so we will have a concert this Saturday I won't bother you anymore because everyone's like looking at us being like what the hell are we doing oh wow so these are the Curtis lockers the big ones and the small ones they must be really deep because I remember having a locker at school and it was just like you could put your whole violin case in there so nice so nice wow this is definitely state of the art this building has a very different vibe from the old building well the base room wow check out all the bases these are the new style practice rooms let's take a look at one so different right it's very very modern I can see the church there I can't tell like which room I'd be more inspired to practice in I don't know I think I'm still more of an old school person though I would probably prefer to practice in the old building what about you hard to say right oh wow this this room is like a smaller room no windows it's more like the chili wait I shouldn't say the J word here it's more like the other music school style no pressure no pressure oh how's it going I'm Ray nice to meet you oh hey well yeah we've met before oh we're just uh shooting a little video here hi uh I'm Chelsea yo this is my sixth year sixth year all right cool I'm Elia soccerly I'm a Pianist and fourth year so it seems like most universities and colleges there's like a four-year program but here at Curtis like it's often the case that many people just extend right and so for you is that like how did that come about uh yeah I didn't know I was going to be here for six years obviously I mean I asked school if I could stay longer and deal they're pretty cool about it oh nice nice were you younger when you got in uh yes I was 15. so chamber music is was and during my time like a really important part of you know your student life you know you it was almost like a popularity contest it seems like you guys are rehearsing some chamber music here right how much like balance do you have or emphasis do you place on it I think for me chamber music is the most important thing to learn at Curtis I think uh right now I'm doing like four groups and I did four groups until like a few days yeah yeah I mean it's really fun to do country music they're promoting on promoting a lot of interesting projects like they did the Holocaust uh program until a few days ago it just feels like they're just like providing me a good kind of like a basis yes yes Foundation yes oh that's awesome well you know what they say even if you're playing Solo or concerto you always treat it like listening like you're in chamber right right as a Pianist I mean it's like if you're not doing any chamber music you're not an orchestra either practicing by yourself right no I think so yeah I think chairman music is very underrated actually a lot of solo pianists we just practice and we don't do much often practicing but I think chamber music really gets us to kind of network a little bit and kind of make friends I guess that's that's true I mean very important well I don't want to bother you too long so but thanks for uh for for sharing yeah looks like I just bumped into another Curtis student what's your name hi Ray hi hi no what's your name my name is your first year here at Curtis yeah this is my first semester oh wow congratulations wait how old are you I'm 17 17 yeah okay and you just moved here how are you liking it I love Philadelphia I still need to practice my English but oh I think I just come here for four months what city did you come from um Shanghai were you at a music school there yeah I mean you would have been very young yes very young Curtis how is it different from you know the music school that environment that you had in Shanghai I think just have more opportunity with the best musician in the world to have chance to play and performance it's I was just talking about chamber music and so is that different like is there more emphasis on chamber music here than uh than at home I will start my Channel music next semester next semester yeah okay how was the audition like you know for you did you fly here to take the audition I take the audition at the last year and it's online I'm still getting very very do you have any tips for the viewers about like the audition at Curtis when you start to play Just breathe and then think about music oh wow okay solid advice I'll try to keep that in mind thanks so much hi Ray nice to meet you nice to meet you yeah it's my honor so while Alex is in rehearsal we are going to go check out the Curtis cafeteria I mean I just saw people in there during Orchestra break they were able to just you know pop down and eat that was something like I didn't used to have but anyway let's go check out the food what's up what's up just checking out the food what's on the menu today coffee coffee how's it going what's your name I'm Jess Jess nice to meet you I'm Ray so what's on the menu for today wow this is this is the makings of great musicianship right here [Music] it's a produce market Thursday there's different vegetables and stuff that they can buy to like take home and cook Mildred all these things that didn't exist before they have it good they have a good all right so we've reached this moment in the video where we've seen most of the school thank you so much for showing us around and uh I think that most of us are also very very curious um about the audition oh yes yeah right so we've got a bunch of questions here how is it like what's the process like like for me you know back then we could pick our first piece in the first round is that still going on right now so what was different for me is that I had online auditioned because it was still covet times but still there was a repertoire mandatory so I think there was one Paganini Caprice one Bach Sonata one concerto like Mozart concerto and also romantic concerto like for example Tchaikovsky sibelius whatever you wanted so it was basically mandatory Repertory but you could choose a lot from it were there still two rounds yes two roads and a free screen around you had to send videos first okay okay do you know how many people auditioned this year there were like 1200 in like all the sections together wow wow and how many violinists got in this year eight wow it depends on how many people graduate right exactly yes so if last year for example eight graduated got it so so it's like certain years you have like a greater chance of getting it exactly it also depends for example the teacher if the teacher says oh I already have like 16 students I don't want more what are some tips that you would give like something that can give people a slight Advantage you know there is definitely something that you can do is contact the teacher you want to study with of course it's it's very good because then you can talk with the teacher you can see if if you're a teacher right exactly example my teacher has a lot of students in her class so I was very nervous that maybe she didn't want me but then yeah we got contact and then I played for her I had master classes before so that was really good I wish that I had known as well definitely master class before if you you can have a contact even once it's like even Music Festival look up where they are where they're teaching or like just I mean these days with email right it's just so easy see I went and just went all the way from Australia all the way here first year I I only auditioned at one school that's also another question that some members of their Community had is like is it good to audition only at one school or is it like sort of this is more of a general audition right I think coming from Europe from Belgium I was really scared that I wouldn't be taken anywhere in America because I you know the level is so high so I auditioned to five different schools to Manhattan uh Juliet Curtis all right all right you're saying all the ones that you rejected all right so like let's just let's just like let's not hurt anyone's feelings here so it was really important I think in the process to you know be ready for auditions does it help to have an audition before the audition I think it's really important to play before as much as possible like run through your pieces so if you have concerts that that's even better so you have a public in front of you and you get nervous or just for your family for your friends just play through as much as possible and then you're not nervous anymore actually this was a more of a life at Curtis kind of question because I've noticed that you know a lot of things have changed since I've been here you know it's gotten a lot brighter is there still a bit of competition between students I think there's definitely you know a small competition that personally you feel a little bit because you want to be very good am I good enough am I a curtised that's sort of like a pressure that you're you place yourself I think everybody puts yes on their self honestly it's like a big family here and that's what I really appreciate in courtesy well anyway thank you so much for spending your time with us today away from your practice saying so you're practicing I feel like I hear somebody else practicing can we like go check in on someone else let's go check it out let's go check it out all right bust in on a person's practice room you know this is the room that I used to like have my lessons in really you have your lessons I still have yes check it out is this a practice police to stop now stop now putting your hands up in the air all right my hands are up it's just you well since you're already here let me show you around my opulent practice room today so this was the space where I basically grew up in where I had my first lessons at Curtis to coachings to of course personal practice sessions you could say that this room is probably where I improved the most as a musician now what makes great progress you might ask some say it's the teachers I say it's a great learning environment and that's what the tonic music app is when you're part of a community where you see others practicing and working hard it can really inspire you to make your progress so much more fun and enjoyable and faster too so joint tonic today just like Curtis it's free only a lot easier to get in I can't wait to cheer you on in your practice rooms [Music] friends

Channel: Ray Chen

Views: 400,394

Keywords: Curtis Institue of Music, twoset, Ray Chen, twoset violin, violin, viola, cello, music, classical music, opera, education, learn, orchestra, piano, singing, public, funny, jazz, guitar, bass

Id: T0s-zHvfOC0

Length: 18min 25sec (1105 seconds)

Published: Fri May 19 2023