Klarinet Archive - Posting 000647.txt from 1996/12

From: Ed Lowry <72122.3073@-----.COM>
Subj: Yale Music
Date: Thu, 26 Dec 1996 16:52:19 -0500

RE: Yale Music

Ryan --

Yale has a fabulous and varied music program. Check out the Yale University Web
pages -- there are several on music. I see their symphony orchestra is playing
Rachmaninoff's second symphony this spring -- not bad for a clarinetist.

Visiting composers and scholars are always at the Yale school of music.
Graduate courses are open to qualified undergraduates, but you must be
qualified. Benny Goodman thought so much of the school that he donated
hundreds of unreleased tapes, notes, etc. just before he died. Paul Hindemith
did some important work at Yale. I could go on. You get the idea.

The bands are great, too. The Yale University "Precision" Marching Band is
anything but precise. It's irreverent and fun. Their football shows spoof
current social and political themes. Membership also gets you free tickets to
the football games and a good seat, if you're interested in that.

At the D-Day 50th anniversary festivities in Europe (1994), a group went over as
the Glenn Miller band (which was stationed on the Yale Campus for a while during
the war). The pictures I saw had the new Miller band in vintage uniforms. It
looked like a lot of fun -- more so than the recent notes on military band gigs
we've been reading on this list.

The concert band is a serious group with an international tour schedule which
should get you out of the country at least once in your four years.

As you know, competition to get into Yale is fierce. (And fiercer now than when
I went in the 70's.) Outstanding grades and test scores are a must. They also
look for something special about the applicant that sets him or her apart.
(Like a number of the Ivy schools, they could fill their class with 4.0 GPA and
1500+ SAT applicants, but choose not to.) Your clarinet playing might be that
something special they look for. If you've got a tape, you should send it in to
be reviewed by someone at the music department.

Unfortunately, Yale is not cheap. It claims to award financial aid based solely
on your family's ability to pay. They figure out what you need, and how much
you've got and make up the difference with grants, loans, and jobs. I worked in
the music department for one of my years there.

You might also check out the scene at Harvard. Their academic requirements are
similar to Yale's -- I coordinate alumni interviews in the Sacramento area, and
many students apply to both schools. Why some get into one and not the other
mystifies Yale and Harvard alums here alike.

Jonathan Cohler majored in physics at Harvard (it says so on his CD's), but he
also found time to develop into a world-class clarinetist as well. You might
search the archives for things he has added to this list. They are a testament
to the value of a liberal education -- his discussions of the physics of sound
are understandable to those of us who majored in subjects like economics.
Jonathan can probably give you a good sense of what's available musically in
Cambridge and probably the rest of New England as well. You could try e-mailing
him at cohler@-----.

Good luck.

Ed Lowry