By the time you attend your first professional audition, you’ll probably be no stranger to the process. Most training courses take students by audition and often there are in-house auditions for performances within the course. Plus you may have auditioned for amateur shows, competitions … maybe you’ve even auditioned for the odd paid gig.
Nonetheless, that first professional audition is going to be a new experience. So, what should you know before auditioning for a full-time job? I spoke to musical theatre choreographer Andrew Hallsworth, who is currently working on Anything Goes, artistic director of Australian Dance Theatre, Garry Stewart, and artistic director of West Australian Ballet, Aurelien Scannella, to get the lowdown on how to tackle professional auditions.
Preparing to audition
Whether you’re auditioning for a musical theatre production, a ballet company or a contemporary company, research is important. According to Aurelien Scannella, when it comes to pursuing a career in ballet, dancers should be researching companies while they are still students, so that they know where they wish to audition when they complete their training. “It’s best to start with medium-sized companies with a broad range of repertoire when you first leave ballet school, because you will get opportunities to perform bigger roles faster [than in a larger company with a more focused repertoire],” he suggests.
Once you are preparing for a specific audition, it’s a good idea to find out as much about that company as possible, says Garry Stewart. “You’d want to find out about the company’s repertoire and style, its philosophy, whether it tours or not, who the choreographers are.”
If you’re auditioning for a musical theatre production, the research is a little different. “Dancers should research the creative team, so they know who is in front of them,” advises Andrew Hallsworth. “It’s also important to have researched the show, so you’re pitching in the right direction … you’ve picked a song that suits the musical and you’re possibly even dressed to suit the musical.”...
This is an extract from an article by Nina Levy from our special Audition Feature in the current issue of Dance Australia! Read the full article! Buy Dance Australia from your favourite retail outlet, or use our free app to purchase and download your copy, or make sure you receive every issue by subscribing here!