Do grades matter for conservatory applications?

[claireliii]

Hi everyone! I am a college student majoring in philosophy in a liberal arts school and am planning to apply for a piano-performance master degree program. That being said, I am now overwhelmed with practicing and doing the work from school. I was wondering if conservatories look at grades at all? Right now I have a 3.7 GPA and I'd only have 2-3 hours to practice if I want to keep this GPA. But my teacher says I will need to practice a lot more than that if I want to get into the better programs. Any advice for me on how to balance school and piano?

[chrismaninoff]

Hi claireliii,

I am currently finishing up my Bachelor's of music.  From what I have experienced and heard from my colleagues and teachers, grades matter somewhat in terms of scholarships in a university setting, but not for the actual admittance decision.  A story that might illustrate this is that when I first wanted to go into music school, I didn't have great grades and I didn't have grade 12 math, which was apparently required by the school that I wanted to apply to.  However, they accepted me without even looking at my transcript, and said that I should just "send it sometime soon."  This is because I played well--both of the piano profs had heard me and wanted me to come to the school. 

I transferred to a different university partway through my degree and it was a similar experience.  No one asked me about my grades or even mentioned them at my interviews, except one lady who was curious as to why I had withdrawn from a certain course. 

Anyways, all that to say, if you play well they will accept you with pretty much any GPA.  If you are an average student they might look at your grades.  And if you play poorly, they won't let you into a performance program no matter what your grades look like. 

Hope that helps!  Feel free to message me if you want to talk more about it.  I also know people at many institutions in the U.K, Canada and U.S., so if you want to talk to a real student I might be able to set that up for ya.  Cheers.