Music and Technology Portfolio Requirements
Please find below questions commonly asked by prospective students, their parents and counselors about the School of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences' portfolio review process for the music and technology program.
If you are applying to our music and technology program you are strongly encouraged to submit a portfolio, but it is not required.
All portfolio materials must be uploaded through your student portal which you’ll receive access to once you have submitted your application. The automated process of receiving student portal credentials can take up to 48 hours after your application has been received.
Examples of creative work can include, but are not limited to, the following:
An original composition/song/track
An original arrangement or orchestration of a preexisting composition
A piece of music that clearly demonstrates creative production techniques
Performance Videos
Demonstration of acoustic or electronic instrument performance
Demonstration of the integration of technology into your performance practice
Demonstration of your interaction with other musicians/audience
Films or videos to which you have composed music or created sound
Other Creative work
Electronic music system design
Software coding, implementation and integration in your music
We require three examples of creative work for the music and technology portfolio.
The system will let you upload more than the required number of pieces; however, we cannot guarantee that all of them will be reviewed. Please try your best to only submit your strongest work. We prefer quality over quantity.
Yes! You can provide a description of every piece that you upload and we strongly recommend that you do so. The more context that you provide for your submission, the easier it is for our faculty to review your contribution to the work.
Make sure you include information describing:
A thorough explanation of your role/roles in the creation of this work
The title and nature of the piece
Your creative methodology
Your reason for submitting the work
Absolutely! We welcome applications from a wide range of backgrounds and experience levels, and don’t assume any specific set of tools or technologies will be familiar to our incoming majors.
Absolutely! We have a broad diversity of creative approaches to sound and music making in our community, and do not require facility with acoustic instrumental performance to enter our program.
Your resume can include: any relevant jobs, internships or collaborations that you’ve had, performances that you’ve participated in, competitions you’ve entered, and volunteer work that you’ve performed.
Absolutely! Just make sure you include a description that lets us know what your contribution to the recording was as well as why you think that particular recording is a good representation of your work as a musician.
If you don’t have access to the original file for something that you would like to submit, a link to a YouTube/Vimeo video or Sound Cloud recording is fine. Again, please be sure to include in the description a thorough explanation of your role/roles in the creation of this work, the title and nature of the piece, your creative methodology, and your reason for submitting the work.
Please do not link to an outside personal website as part of your portfolio because we will not know which pieces to prioritize.
Although we technically support media files as large as 5 GB, please be advised that larger files will take longer to upload from your Internet connection and may stall if you are on a wireless connection or one that cannot sustain a connection for the necessary period of time. Uploaded documents may contain no more than 75 pages. We support the following file formats:
Video: .avi, .flv, .m1v, .m2v, .m4v, .mkv, .mov, .mpeg, .mpg, .mp4, .webm, .wmv
Audio: .aac, .aif, .aiff, .iff, .fla, .m4a, .mpa, .mp3, .ra, .wav, .wma
Slide: .bmp, .gif, .jpg, .jpeg, .png, .tif, .tiff
Document: .doc, .docx, .odg, .odp, .odt, .pdf, .ppt, .pptx, .rtf, .wpd