Please review and prepare all requirements thoroughly. Auditions are held in person at NIU in February, unless otherwise determined. Please register for your audition date.
If you are unable to attend our formal audition days, contact our music admissions coordinator for permission to schedule an independent audition or obtain approval to submit an unedited video audition and complete a virtual interview. Please bring copies of your music for the adjudication panel.
Classical Piano
A minimum of three compositions of your choice from different style periods, such as baroque, classical, romantic, impressionistic or contemporary.
Undergraduate students
- Composition from the Baroque period, such as a Bach two- or three-part invention, prelude and fugue, partita, suite or toccata
- Sonata-allegro movement from a Classical period sonata
- Composition from the literature of the 19th, 20th, or 21st century
Undergraduates will complete an aural skills assessment at the time of audition. Sight reading exercises may be given at the time of audition.
Graduate Students
Successful graduate auditions will demonstrate more artistic playing and select more sophisticated and difficult repertoire from each of the Baroque, Classical, Romantic, Impressionistic and Contemporary eras. Sight reading exercises may be given at the time of audition.
Organ
Undergraduate Students
- Polyphonic composition in three voices (such as a Rheinberger trio, three-voice chorale setting by Dupré, etc.)
- Composition of the student’s choice of comparable difficulty with Bach’s Eight Little Preludes and Fugues
- Read at sight a four-part hymn setting (not required for Music Minor applicants):
- Soprano, alto, and tenor on one manual, bass in the pedal
- Soprano on one manual (right hand), alto and tenor on a second manual (left hand), bass in the pedal
- A few short pedal exercises selected by the student, with particular attention to evenness rather than speed
Undergraduates will complete an aural skills assessment at the time of audition. Sight reading exercises may be given at the time of audition.
Graduate Students
- Large prelude and fugue by J. S. Bach
- One movement from a Bach trio sonata
- Two contrasting movements from the 19th or 20th century French repertoire
- Read at sight a trio of moderate difficulty
Harpsichord
Graduate Students
- A work by J. S. Bach
- French literature of the 17th or 18th centuries
- Italian literature of the 17th century