Juilliard School

 

Master of Music and Graduate Diploma Applicants:

  1. All applicants are required to submit an essay as a component of the online application.
  2. Juilliard’s Admissions Committee uses your essay to learn more about you as an individual, and gain a sense of who you are beyond your application, transcript and audition. 
  3. Essays should be 1 - 2 pages, double-spaced, in a 12 point font.
  4. Choose one of the following essay topics:

 

    1. Describe the most challenging obstacle you have had to overcome; discuss its impact, and tell us what you have learned from the experience.
    2. Dr. Joseph Polisi, Juilliard’s president, has stated: “. . . [talented young people are] responsible for more than getting the notes right or the words right or the steps right. They have to be missionaries for the arts." Write about how, as an artist, you intend to advocate for the relevancy of the arts in the twenty-first century.
    3. Using one of these words as the title of your essay, write about what the word means to you:
      1. Commitment
      2. Education
      3. Discipline
  1. Your essay should be submitted through the online application.
  2. Please do not also submit a hard copy of your essay via post.

 

Doctor of Musical Arts Applicants:

  1. All applicants are required to submit two essays as a component of the online application.
  2. Juilliard’s Admissions Committee uses your essays to learn more about you as an individual, and gain a sense of who you are beyond your application, transcript and audition. 
  3. Essays should be 1 - 2 pages, double-spaced, in a 12 point font.
  4. D.M.A. applicants must complete both 1 and 2 of the following:

 

    1. Explain your motivation for pursuing the D.M.A. degree, what you might want to explore as your D.M.A. document, and how your experience in the doctoral program will be relevant to your performing and/or academic career.
    2. Who has been your most influential teacher and why?
  1. Your essays should be submitted through the online application.
  2. Please do not also submit hard copies of your essays via post.