Product Description

Product Description
Outlines career opportunities in theater and the performing arts, discussing such aspects as salaries, skill requirements, advancement prospects, and how to get started in the business. ... Read more

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Audience behavior began to shift dramatically in the mid 1990s. Since then, people have become more spontaneous in purchasing tickets and increasingly prefer selecting specific programs to attend rather than buying a subscription series. Arts attenders also expect more responsive customer service than ever before. Because of these and other factors, many audience development strategies that sustained nonprofit arts organizations in the past are no longer dependable and performing arts marketers face many new challenges in their efforts to build and retain their audiences. Arts organizations must learn how to be relevant to the changing lifestyles, needs, interests, and preferences of their current and potential audiences.

Arts Marketing Insights offers managers, board members, professors, and students of arts management the ideas and information they need to market effectively and efficiently to customers today and into the future. In this book, Joanne Scheff Bernstein helps readers to understand performing arts audiences, conduct research, and provide excellent customer service. She demonstrates that arts organizations can benefit by expanding the meaning of "valuable customer" to include single-ticket buyers. She offers guidance on long-range marketing planning and helps readers understand how to leverage the Internet and e-mail as powerful marketing channels. Bernstein presents vivid case studies and examples that illustrate her strategic principles in action from organizations large and small in the United States, Great Britain, Australia, and other countries. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Arts Marketing
As a teacher of Arts Marketing , I found this book to be invaluable. Definitely the best text in this area I have come across. The author clearly has in depth experience of the arts and the book is well laid out and easy to read. The case studies in the text of various arts organisations really help to explain aspects of Arts marketing. A great read!

Great cases, fantastic resource
A truly great resource for arts professionals at all points in their careers. Bernstein uses engaging stories to bring to life principles of marketing. Her experience is evident.

Unparalleled analysis of Arts Marketing.A must read!
This book was recommended to me by a colleague.In my profession I work closely with staff at many performing arts organizations who really could benefit from reading this book.The author does not simply pontificate, she provides a really fresh look at the challenges and opportunities for increasing audience size, connecting with patrons, improving financial health, website best practices, marketing campaigns, the list goes on and on.Best of all, Ms. Bernstein backs up her findings and recommendations with research and case studies - introducing the reader to methodology that is sure to win over any board of directors skeptical of change.I give this book 5 stars! ... Read more

Product Description
Gives information, including admissions requirements, costs, and programs offered, on two hundred and fifty college and conservatory programs in every major performing arts specialty, and offers advice on passing admission auditions. Amazon.com Review
From a standard college guide you can find loads of statisticsabout student-to-teacher ratios and women-to-men ratios, SAT averagesand grade-point averages, number of applicants versus number ofacceptances, and how many parties there are on a Saturday night (muchof which is included here, too), but if you're looking to major in theperforming arts, you'll have some specific needs the general book willnot address. Carole Everett's The Performing Arts Major's CollegeGuide provides specialized sections for dance, drama, andmusic. She discusses the audition at length, going into what to wearand how to deal with nerves, when to time the audition and what toexpect, by what criteria the auditions are evaluated, and whatnot to do.

For these audition sections alone the guide is worth it. The book goeson, however, to explain the various degrees possible for each majorand discuss matters relevant to every college applicant--such asvisiting campuses, college interviews, the application process, andfinancial aid, plus matters particularly pertinent to arts majors,such as assessing one's talent and setting realistic goals. The mostvital section follows: the selected listing of performing-artsprograms, where for dance and drama, it ranks programs from "mosthighly recommended" to "recommended" to "noteworthy," and does thesame for music, also detailing programs for every area of study, fromjazz to orchestra to composition, and many instrument programs, aswell, from accordion and bassoon to tuba and voice. In addition,there's an informational section on conservatory programs, and anumber of appendices covering alternative careers, an index of schoolsby state and country, and a checklist for parents. With such focusedinformation, this is a singularly helpful guide for the studentpursuing one of the performing arts.--Stephanie Gold ... Read more

Customer Reviews (8)

Laurie
When first published I am sure this book was an excellent resource, but it was published in 1998 making it next to useless now. When I ordered this book the publishing date was not shown on Amazon's website.

In Amazon's defense when I complained their response was execellent.I was able to return the book and get all my money back including shipping.I also note that publishing dates are now included on the website.Thank you Amazon!

Performing Arts College Guide, 3rd edition
I have teenage sons interested in vocal and/or instrumental performance degrees.This Guide provides solid information about types of programs, what to expect in auditions, and how best to prepared for the process.It is written by a former Julliard admissions counselor.It would probably be worth spending the $$ on the current addition.This addition is dated.

Helpful guide to music schools
I used the 2nd edition of this book when I was an undergraduate searching for a good grad school. I found the information to be clear, and, for the most part, accurate. Of course, teachers and institutions can change rapidly, so a student would be wise to consult a university's website or recruiting materials for the most up-to-date information, but I found the print guide to be a good starting point. I am now a university music teacher and recently had one of my students use the 3rd edition while searching for a grad school.

Yes, this book is primarily intended for high school students. However, a graduate student may also find it to be of use...I did!

WARNING! NOT FOR STUDENTS ALREADY ENROLLED IN COLLEGE!
You might think that this is a guide for students already in college, but beware.Though it has some good advice, it is supposed to be written for high school students wanting to major in drama, dance, or music in college.

A second warning: This book is dated, five year-old material.

Faulty Editing in Dance Section
I bought this guide to help me decide on a dance program, particularly between two in Arizona. Unfortunately there are lots of typos in the book, it seems as if it hasn't been edited (at least the dance section). Some of the mistakes are the following:

1-The schools such as Temple University, Texas Christian University and Towson State University appeared under the "recommended" and"noteworthy" categories for dance. However, in the full description of each school the Author's Comment states all three as" recommended" for dance.

2- The University of Arizona, Tucson is listed in the"noteworthy" category for dance, but later in the full description the Author's Comment reads, "highly recommended" for dance.

I was very confused as to which to believe; the list of schools by category or the Author's Comment.Over all, for me these mistakes are misleading and detract from the credibility of the guide.

On the good side the guide provides you with a lot of information on what to expect from the auditions, and even show you examples of evaluation sheets the teachers use in schoolssuch as Julliard.
It is mostly geared to High school students so if you are an adult seeking to study dance, most of the information will not be helpful. ... Read more

Product Description
This text addresses the business skills that are essential to those involved in the performing arts. With increasing emphasis on freelance and small-scale work in the arts, this book provides an introduction to areas such as marketing, finance and fund raising. ... Read more

Product Description
The first book that applies the full range of forprofit marketing principles to the not-for-profit, institutionally based performing arts. Outlines a clear process for defining an organization's mission, as well as for selecting, analyzing, and implementing relevant marketing initiatives. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

A reputation well-deserved
Kotler and Scheff have managed to write a textbook that is relevant, well-organized AND interesting!While the style is characteristically dry, the prose is peppered with plenty of real-life case studies that help elucidate both the marketing concepts themselves and the application thereof.The chapters are helpfully broken into sub-categories which makes for easy note-taking and comprehension.I can see why this has been the Arts Marketing bible for so long.The only thing we need is an updated version with more intense focus on internet marketing, etc.

Comprehensive But...
This is a decent reference book if you have limited marketing experience. If you have any Graduate level marketing classes or marketing experience, you'll find it to be like the other Kotler books: stale and behind the times.

Standard Text
I found Standing Room only was useful as the recommended text for the Arts Management Post Graduate at UTS Sydney. It would be great for a new edition to be published that includes more recent marketing examples and methods, like e- business and contemporary arts organisations as it is really dated.

One of the Best
I've been in the entertainment public relations business for 30 years and this book is one of the best I've encountered.It's accurate, up to date, well-written and thorough.

Extraordinary Compendium
If you want to run an arts organization or run one now, or run part of one: have a long visit with this book.As an MBA who has interviewed many performing arts managers and worked as a performing arts funder and on various boards over decades, I commend this to all people in the business except my competitors.

It wouldn't be fair to compare this to other business how-to books because it is a compendium, not just management theories-du-jour.And perhaps because not-for-profits have a "spiritual" side, the reader senses that the authors are holding nothing back out of mercenary considerations.So if you suspect you don't know everything about running a performing arts organization, this is the place to start.

The book is a gift, a mission informed by the authors' love of and belief in the arts as inherently good.Just one idea gleaned here could save your organization, especially in times of funding and subscription-ticketing stress.While a revised edition might meld more internet ideas into the fantastic array of tips-'n-tools presented, as-is, "SRO" is exhaustive but not exhausting. ... Read more

Product Description
A dictionary explaining the most significant business and legal terms and practical issues relating to the performing arts. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Keep this on your reference shelf: it'll HELP!
When I left a nearly 20 year newspaper career to become a ventriloquist and run around with a bunch of dummies (wait -- isn't THAT called political reporting??) I had absolutely no idea about the business side of show business. As a newspaper reporter I learned about "intellectual property" only when I did a story about it. And once I went into ventriloquism fulltime I had(and have) folks constantly urge me to set up a non-profit group for my extensive work with kids...but I had absolutely no idea what "non-profit" even meant, except perhaps some months of the year when it seemed as if I was in fact running a non-profit enterprise.

In all SERIOUSNESS: this wonderful concise book answers any questions you have. Entertainment actually involves having to deal with lots of complicated legalisms (contracts, kinds of insurance, what managers do, legal requirements on record keeping, leases, social security, etc.) This book covers them all (and more) and topics are alphabetized. Each topic is dealt with with the absolute number of words necessary -- not an overkill, not an oversimplification. It's a reference for any kind of performer, as well as anyone involved with or interested in the arts.

At the end there's even a listing of trade organizations, mailing list brokers, volunteer lawyers for the arts, and other associations and groups dealing with the arts. Each listing has an address and phone number. This book could save you LOTS of time -- and painful mistakes -- and free up LOTS more "creative time"! ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

DISAPPOINTED
For the money, I had expected some decent plates of the artists' works...nothing. Also, the book just smells funky. ... Read more

Product Description
Opportunities in Performing Arts Careers offers job seekers essential information about a variety of careers within the performing arts field and includes training and education requirements, salary statistics, and professional and Internet resources. ... Read more

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This resource presents biographies of American women in the performing arts from the 19th century onwards. There are 150 entries profiling film, stage and TV actresses; dancers; musicians; opera stars; and performance artists. Each entry emphasizes the woman's contributions as an artist. ... Read more

Product Description
This work probes the topic of teaching as a performing art, focusing on the role of teachers in galvanizing an audience - their students. It argues that teachers will better engage learners if they are prepared in the "artistry" of doing so. The author sees teachers as actors and thus uses the traditions of stage performance to inspire ways to foster connections between teachers and students. Sarason elucidates how the rehearsal processes actors undergo and the direction they receive, for example, would be similarly beneficial for educators. Recognizing that implementing his ideas would require a profound rethinking of teacher training programmes, Sarason urges why they are crucial to excellence in education. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Take A Bow
One of the books I started LAST summer, and finished THIS SUMMER, (with plans to re-read all that I've already FORGOTTEN) is this book.
Teaching, and I say this from my 27 years trying it, is really so much about performing. And in a sense one has to have a repertoire ready to deploy in the moment, this book more fully addresses and discusses something often not exposed in teacher ed programs-or at least not so well in mine-that performance enhancing repertoire and what it can do for the learner.

However luckily for me, I had an art ed teacher, Bill Thomas at WVU, he did in fact address teaching as art form,as did my father- master teachers (both really in similar questioning-discovery vein). Often I've thought about how designing effective lessons is about your artful communication skill, and watching peers often I realize how many in the field, toomany,are very uncomfortable just within that communication. Some hide behind content, duller than anything, while others simply bore your socks off lacking knowing anything to say. Or do. Or have you do.
It's a very good book to start to consider the actual "act" of teaching, and to try to gain some better understandings for carrying it out.

Maxine Greene in her foreword captured me with her supportive comments that allude to this book as conversation on the art of teaching. Very interesting.

One thing that I've felt over these last few mandated curriculum years was that active engagement of students seemed as politically anemic words, just words, peppered through trainings that duncified how to achieve it with Kagan strategies and other fumbling, bumbling artificial methods-turn to your partner, hoedown, mix and shout, over the top and so many seemingly idiotic types of devices to try to get students to be engaged and to feel they are active participants in the process. Maybe it is because I came out of art and art education into my own teaching where after a topic, idea, project, theme was stated everyone went into making art work as a "response" along with dialog, it might be that early on I realized that you are as Carl Rogers so brilliantly taught, the facilitator in a dialog.Often the all of it is a process of finding your path to understanding.It maybe that you make artifacts, work in models, create something, use projects, but what is happening is you are creating as a process of discussion, a basis for a group to interact and think together. Dad called it Socratic teaching. And in that way I think performance as teaching is very old indeed. It may be that. I don't know. I do know I learn more in the process of working than I teach. I've called it constructivism, how I approach the work. But as a piece to add to my understanding this book focuses on what the teacher specifically is saying, doing, and observes situations to dialog about that and its effect on learners.

It is a bit "drier" because it has academic and research basis. It's well worth the time and has given me quite a lot of help in considering the art I practice and developing my language to share it.

Weak performance
This book is dull. For a potentially interesting topic, it was like chewing grits without salt, little substance and no flavor. It was a waste of time and money. I threw it into the recycle sack where it could be put to better use.

A Tour de Force by a Uniquely Accomplished Observer
This remarkable book explains that teachers need to be just as accomplished performers as are successful artists - actors, orchestra conductors, dancers, or singers. It discusses how this need could be dealtwith in teacher preparation programs. It will be heartwarming for teacherswho already know this; it will be an eyeopener for anyone who believes thatteachers require only knowledge of the subject to be taught. I believe thatthe problems of teacher quality will not be resolved until the observationsin this book are widely understood and acted upon. Moreover, thisbook is very timely. The issue of teacher preparation and teacher qualityhas now become central to education reform nationally, thanks to pressuresfrom teachers themselves, from their unions, from the existence of theNational Board on Professional Teaching Standards, and from a growingpolitical focus on teacher quality. Another eyeopener is "TheTeaching Gap" by James Stigler and Jmaes Hiebert, which explains howand why teaching is different in Japan from what it is here. (Thedifferences are partly due to a visit to Japan by John Dewey early in thiscentury.) ... Read more

Product Description
There has long been a need to introduce performing-arts enthusiasts and students to the fascinating field of iconography, both as manifested in art history and in its more pragmatic or applied forms. Yet relatively little systematic effort has been made to collect and interpret centuries of such visual evidence in the light of the best available art-historical information, combined with corroborating textual documentation and insights from the histories of performance disciplines. Aspiring iconographers of the performing arts need to be aware that there are often several levels of interpretation which great works of visual art will sustain. This book explores these levels of interpretation: a surface or literal reading, a deeper reading of the work which seeks to enter the mind of the artist and asks how and why he put a given work together, and the deepest reading of the work relating it to the artistic traditions and culture in which the artist lived. In expounding on these levels of iconographic interpretations four discourses by scholars active in the study of visual records are given in relation to traditions, techniques, and trends: performance in general (Katritzky), music (Heck), theatre (Erenstein), and dance (Smith). Effort is made to keep abreast of modern technology influencing iconographic representations as on the Internet and virtual reality. ... Read more

Product Description
In an age of globalization, performance is increasingly drawn from intercultural creativity and located in multicultural settings. This volume is the first to focus on the performing arts of Asian diasporas in the context of modernity and multiculturalism. The essays locate the contemporary performing arts as a discursive field in which the boundaries between tradition and translation, and authenticity and hybridity are redefined and negotiated to create a multitude of meaning and aesthetics in global and local contexts.
With contributions from scholars of Asian studies, theatre studies, anthropology, cultural studies, dance ethnology and musicology, this truly interdisciplinary work covers every aspect of the sociology of performance of the Asian diasporas. ... Read more

Product Description
This professional reference provides solid advice to academic and public librarians for managing performing arts collections. The volume is divided into sections on the history of performing arts librarianship, dance collections, film studies collections, music collections, and theater collections. Each chapter is written by one or more expert contributors and presents current and reliable information on collection management. They discuss personnel management, collection development, technical services, public services, the impact of new technologies, facilities management, financial planning, and political considerations. Each chapter closes with references cited in the chapter, and the volume concludes with a valuable selected, annotated bibliography of important background sources and management tools. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (1)

Shaman Versus Showman
The basic tricks and techniques of magic have not changed over the centuries.Emerging from locked boxes, pulling objects from manifestly empty containers, and so on, can be found in descriptions and magic manuals from the seventeenth century, and legend has it that even if Ancient Egyptian magicians were not sawing a woman in half, they were capable of decapitating geese and restoring their heads to them.They probably did the "cup and balls" trick, too, making a ball show up under a cup where it could not have been or disappearing from under a cup where it just had to be.The shows may have been the same, but what people made of them differed through the ages.Saw a woman in half a few centuries ago and you risked being tried for black magic, for instance, even if it was "just a trick".The conjurer pretends, and the audience helps him get away with it, that he has special powers.In a famous definition by illusionist Robert-Houdin, a conjurer is "an actor playing the part of a magician".The role is of a sorcerer with capacities that defy logic and physics, when of course the conjurer is just playing with the minds of the audience.The boundaries of performance that challenge the spectator's sense of reality, and the changes of those boundaries over time, are the subject of an erudite study by Michael Mangan, _Performing Dark Arts: A Cultural History of Conjuring_ (Intellect).You may get hints of how magicians do some of their tricks from this book; if they have been around for millennia, it's to be expected that some of the secrets would slip out.That's not Mangan's point.This is more a study of such tricks as staged illusions in comparison with the "real" spells and black magic that wizards are supposed to be able to do.General opinion has recently gone against such wizardry, but it is still playing a role.

In the Bible's most famous account of magicians at work, Moses and Aaron go up against the Egyptian magicians, a duel that involves turning staffs into snakes.Both sides would have wanted to have been seen as working real miracles, but by the time of the Renaissance, the Egyptians in the story were held to be mere tricksters, and a Victorian account says that the same trick was still being done in Cairo, with actual serpents hypnotized into rod-like stiffness, to resume snake-life when thrown upon the ground.Moses and Aaron, however, where held to have used the _real_ magic, the kind that comes from the real God.Religion constantly is mixed with stage magic through the centuries.Magical transformations were held to be the product of human alliance with "The Father of Lies", the devil himself.Unfortunately, once Protestantism took hold, churchmen such as Calvin could maintain that the transubstantiation of the Eucharist was merely a play at a magical incantation and transformation.

The "shaman / showman" dichotomy has not left us.There are still those who insist that their illusions are products of the supernatural.In the twentieth century, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes, was one of the many believers in spiritualism.He was tricked over and over by blatant phonies, and he insisted that his one-time friend Houdini was performing by means of supernatural aid, although Houdini disavowed such practices and famously campaigned against spiritualism.Mangan admits, however, that in believing in spirits and spiritualists, Doyle was merely on the side of such lights as Marconi, Edison, and Tesla.The descendants of spiritualists, those who can channel ancient personalities or those who can in front of an audience make it seem as if they are getting messages from departed relatives, continue to earn their livings from insisting that these are supernatural effects rather than the well-known practice of "cold reading" that stage mentalists can perform.Uri Geller claims he is not bending spoons the way other magicians bend spoons, the way that James Randi bends spoons.Randi takes the role of Enlightenment rationalist, effectively debunking Geller's claims (he also takes on the modern day spiritualists).After all, if Geller is really bending by supernatural means, then modern physics and chemistry will have to be rewritten.Geller's bending spoons, though, and his "I am really doing this without any trickery" stance have transformed a performer of a simple trick into an international celebrity, which as Mangan writes, is "one of the most powerful forms of twentieth-century metamorphosis."There are magicians like Penn and Teller who deliberately call attention to the artificial nature of their tricks, even demonstrating on stage how some are performed, and put on a good show for all that.Conjurers as performers have always had a special niche in exploiting the marvelous or the uncanny and trading upon our hope or fantasy that some real magic may be at work.Mangan's delightful book shows that they will always be able to do so.
... Read more

Product Description
Peterson’s College Guide for Performing Arts Majorshelps students find the perfect college program for studying dance, music, or theater. Comprehensive profiles detail hundreds of professional baccalaureate and graduate programs, with annually updated information on costs, deadlines, enrollment, faculty, financial aid, and more. Added features include in-depth guidance and advice from a former Juilliard admissions director on choosing a program, applying, and auditioning, as well as articles by current students about what it’s really like to major in dance, music, and theater. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Poor at best
This guide is HUGELY disappointing. It leaves out major players in the performing arts and the information on which programs universities have (BA, BFA, etc.) is incredibly inaccurate. It may be the only guide out there, but if you use it beware, the info is very misleading.....

Useful start to college search
This book is a useful guide when looking for Performing art Colleges.Not all schools are included, though and some of the information needs to be updated, but overall, it is a great starting point. ... Read more

Product Description
Solo artists and performing groups of all types will find everything needed to book performances, build tours, and succeed on the road in the third edition of this classic reference. This third edition of BOOKING & TOUR MANAGEMENT FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS has been updated to include information about the revolutionary new ways that performers, managers, and presenters are using the Internet to transform the business of booking live performing events. Special chapters by outside experts provide in-depth information about what presenters need from artists, the technical aspects of touring, the unique demands of touring abroad, and touring through the eyes of the artist. The book includes a Tour Manager’s Resource Kit and numerous other ready-to-use sample materials, including a contract, letter of agreement, technical information questionnaire, performance checklists, calendars, schedules, tour budget model, technical glossary, and much more. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

How to arrange everything from transport to payday schedules
Rena Shagan's Booking & Tour Management For The Performing Artstells how to turn a booking into a tour, how to set up the budgets and target prospects, and how to arrange everything from transport to payday schedules. Chapters on what presenters need from artists make the essential link between artist and businessman.

Don't mistake this for a commercial music biz book.
If you're handling tours for theater groups, dance troupes, folk singers doing the NACA circuit or classical musicians you'll find everything you need in this book.

If you're in a band playing clubs this isn't the book for you.Don't expect to find any advice on dealing with club owners or doing in-stores here. I've seen local rock bands buy this book thinking that it was going to give them tips for doing a club tour because they misunderstood the term 'Performing Arts'.

I would, however, recommend the book to anyone that's interested in becoming a tour manager for bands or is just getting started as one. There's some very useful information that you can adapt to the commercial music biz.

A terrific resource for the touring classical musician
This is the only book I've found that addresses the questions of management, booking, publicity, contract negotiation, budgeting, and market trends for those of us working in classical music.It's extremely helpful,clearly written, and comprehensive.What a relief to get answers to thesequestions without having to wade through lots of irrelevent stuff aboutclub dates and laser light shows!For once, the tone is right, theresources cited are appropriate, and the timetables are tailored to theclassical music marketplace.The author, a former dancer, spends quite alot of her time addressing the concerns of touring dance companies, butthere's plenty of information for chamber musicians, theater companies,touring recitalists, and instrumental and vocal soloists seekingengagements with orchestras or opera companies.Now, if there were only abook like this that focused entirely on the details of creating promotionalmaterials... ... Read more

Product Description
Becoming involved in the arts is not a one-step process, but aprogression through several stages.This study offers a six-stagemodel for use by both arts managers and researchers in the field. ... Read more

Product Description
Before you can frame newspaper reviews of your sold-out performance at Carnegie Hall, deliver an acceptance speech to the Screen Actor's Guild, or dance your way to stardom, you'll put in years of hard work and make many important decisions.

It starts with finding the program that's best for you. The Princeton Review's Guide to Performing Arts Programs helps you choose from over 700 colleges, high schools, and summer programs in dance, drama, and music. Carole Everett and Muriel Topaz, both formerly of The Juilliard School, are experts in the arts and the admissions process, and will guide you through school selection, auditions, interviews, and more.

700 programs are profiled--more than any other guide--including addresses, phone numbers, and contact names for each program. Plus:

Customer Reviews (3)

Useless
We bought this book because standard college guides focus only on traditional majors and standard academic measures (average SATs, male/female breakdown, etc.), without any kind of detail on the many performing arts programs hidden within U.S. universities. We hoped it would fulfill its promise of profiling hundreds of programs, so that my daughter -- an aspiring actress seeking good artistic training amid a rich liberal arts environment -- could zero in on the best schools for her needs. But upon reading through it we were appalled -- at first by the countless typos (clearly no copy editor reviewed the entries) and then, increasingly, by the lack of adequate information on well over half the schools we looked up. As a previous reviewer noted, the book completely misrepresents many respected and extensive programs by simply omitting much of their basic data from their entries. We finally gave up on the book because we could not trust it; how could my daughter use it to compare programs when so many listings omit extremely important program data -- such as whether there is an acting program at all, what the course offerings are, whether auditions are required, how many theaters the campus houses, etc.?

The impression I got after reading through several dozen entries is that the editors had sent surveys to hundreds of schools, but that they had a rigid deadline and went to press regardless of whether all the schools had sent back the requested information in time -- that they went to press thinking, "If these schools can't find time to send us information, that's their problem. They just won't have their information included in our book."And that would be an acceptable attitude if this were the Yellow Pages and the entries were paid advertisements -- but this is supposed to be a reference book, not a collection of ads. The readers shell out a hefty sum for it, and the editors owe us more than a "here's the information we got before deadline" attitude. This book is missing so much critical information, and the information it does include is so poorly presented, that it can't possibly be considered a valid resource.

Young performing artists have precious little information to draw upon when they are searching for a college, and this book does almost nothing to make their search any easier.

Lack of Information
While this guide boasts having a beefy number of pages, the information is what is lacking. Only the largest universities (i.e. University of ____ or ____ State) are properly defined in the performing arts areas. The majority of colleges out there are not the most popular but should be given this advantage anyway. Instead, a grand majority of this book's universities are shown as not even having fine arts programs when they actually have fantastic ones. I bought this book with the hopes of being able to narrow down my own college options and was appalled when I saw that it clearly does NOT own up to "700 programs are profiled--more than any other guide." So, when you're out searching for universities offering performing arts, just go to CollegeBoard. It's a much safer and cost-effective deal.

Good Practical Guide
This is a good book for 2 reasons. It clearly profiles college music programs, and also recognizes that there is a lot to be learned at the high school and summer camp level. The irony is that some high scools and summer camps are actually better than some colleges.It is very easy to read. ... Read more

Product Description
This book examines recent trends in the performing arts and discusses howthe arts are likely to evolve in the future. It is the first book to providea comprehensive overview of the performing arts, including analysis ofopera, theater, dance, and music, in both their live and recorded forms. Theauthors focus on trends affecting four aspects of the performing arts--audiences, performers, arts organizations, and financing--and offer a visionfor the future. The book discusses the implications of current and likelyfuture developments and considers public policy issues such as publicfunding for the arts. ... Read more