Auditions

image: Byrd on display at Folger Shakespeare Library

Auditions for our 26-27 concert season will be held September 2, 8, 10, 5-9 PM  at The Ascension and Saint Agnes, 1215 Mass Ave NW.  Sign up for audtions at the link below. If you have questions please email us and we will do our best to answer them.  

What to expect

• Auditions are 15 minutes long at most.  There are four slots available each hour. Auditions are held one on one.  

• Please arrive around 10 minutes before your time slot and no more than 15 minutes early. 

• You will have more time to work on the sight-singing extract if you complete your singer on-boarding form in advance (see button, below).
  
  

On arrival 

• You will be asked to sign in and confirm that you have completed the online singer form

• You will be handed a sight-singing extract to prepare, and shown to a room where you can have a few minutes to prepare it (please download a piano app in advance)

• After a few minutes you will be invited to come to the choir room where our Artistic Director will be sitting at the piano. DCI's policy is to have an additional DCI person either in the room or just outside the room for everyone's safety.
  
  

During your audition 

• You will be asked a few questions about things that you wrote about on your singer intake form 

• You will then be asked to sing:

  • comfortably in the middle of your range, vocalizing on scales or arpeggios, and on long notes on different vowels

  • some basic ear tests (e.g. clapping or singing back a rhythm or melody heard twice, picking out notes in a three or four note chord, turning an open fifth into a major or minor chord as directed by humming the missing middle note, singing a well-known melody in different modes or rhythms)

  • one of your prepared pieces from the list (either either REQUIEM #5 Hymnus mm 7-14  or REQUIEM #6 mm. 1-8 ―see button, below).

  • your prepared sight-reading extract

• You will be assessed on your musical abilities, vocal quality, ability to self-correct and respond to direction, more so than your ability to provide a perfect performance or finished sight-reading product

Everyone hates auditions. Know that the person leading your audition is seeking to encourage and not to catch out, and has also not enjoyed auditioning.
Please let us know if there is anything you need in order to have the most comfortable experience.

DCI plans to record auditions to help assess potential singers’ qualifications and may retain applicants’ contact information for administrative purposes. DCI will not sell or transfer this information. By auditioning, applicants consent to this data policy and to the finality of DCI’s Artistic Director’s decisions about audition results. DCI singers allow DCI to use photos, video and sound recordings of them taken at DCI concerts and other events.

We are grateful to the Rector and Wardens of the The Ascencion and St. Agnes for their hospitality.

What to do now:

1. Download the prepared pieces

2. Sign-up for a time

3. Complete your singer form

Life happens.  If you need to reschedule, please try and let us know 24 hours in advance.