National Council Auditions
Are You Ready?
As a singer, you may be asking yourself, "Am I ready for a Metropolitan Opera National Council Audition?" Auditions are something that most singers never feel ready for, yet, the more you do, the better auditioner you become.
You may audition for the National Council only once per season, but there is no limit as to how many seasons you may audition (as long as you fit the National Council eligibility requirements).
The National Council Auditions also have open boundaries, meaning that you can choose to enter the District Audition that is the most convenient for you. You don’t have to audition in the location where you are from or go to school. You can audition in a place where you might be working on a production or where you might be traveling to another audition already. The only restriction is that if you are chosen as a District Winner, you must participate in the Region Finals of the Region where you were a District Winner.
Other unique benefits of the National Council Auditions are:
- To be heard by professionals in the business. Even though prize money is given, the real value to these auditions is what you learn from them. There are three judges at every level of the competition chosen from a selected list of professionals in the business. We make them available to you following the competition, so that you might ask questions and hear first hand their thoughts about your presentation that day.
- To get an idea of how your development is going. Perhaps you are still in school. You’ve been working on several arias and you have five that you feel pretty good about and now you want to know how you compare to others at your stage of development.
- To advance professionally. The professionals who judge for the National Council are part of a larger network. Many of them are in a position to recommend you for work, advanced study, or an apprenticeship. National Council auditions are more than just another "stand and sing" audition.