Online Resources
This list of journals, databases, and arts organizations will help you get started identifying opportunities and resources related to your musical interests.
Wisr
Wisr is a platform designed to connect Oberlin students with Oberlin alumni in their field of interest who are eager to share advice and expertise.
Bridge: Worldwide Music Connection
Bridge is a massive database of opportunities including performance, teaching, and administrative jobs, competitions, music festivals, and more. Current Oberlin students have free access through Oberlin’s institutional account.
Handshake
Handshake is the Oberlin College Career Development Center’s internal database for summer and winter-term internships, job listings, and other opportunities. Use your Oberlin ID to login.
Liberal Arts Career Network (LACN)
Includes internships, summer positions, and full-time job listings in some of the most popular liberal arts fields. LACN is a consortium of 39 top liberal arts colleges and universities.
Orchestral job postings:
Region-specific opportunities:
Opera auditions and vocal competitions:
Church and sacred music job postings:
- Yale Institute of Sacred Music
- American Guild of Organists
- National Association of Pastoral Musicians
Cruise ship jobs:
Audio engineering and acoustics job listings:
Arts administration jobs and internships:
Higher education:
- College Music Society (membership required)
- Chronicle of Higher Education
- HigherEdJobs.com
- InsideHigherEd.com
Examples of discipline-specific job listings:
Vacancy and research listings at European higher education institutions:
Jazz educators:
- Jazz Education Network (JEN)
Teaching artists:
Competitions and music festivals:
Artist residencies:
Union resources:
International arts and culture journals:
Examples of region-specific artist resources:
Arts advocacy:
Services, programs, and technology solutions:
Professional development resources:
Legal resources for artists:
Tax resources and articles for artists:
- Freelance Tax and Finance
- 6 Tips for Preparing Documentation (Fractured Atlas)
- Musicians Guide to Reaching Organizational Nirvana in the New Year (New Music Box)
- Tax Issues for Musicians (Howland Tax Service)
Non-resident tax preparation for international students and scholars:
Scholarships, Grants and Fellowships
Oberlin College Libraries' Grant Writing Tips and Support
Tips for Successful Grant Writing from Musical America
Oberlin College's Comprehensive Listing of Fellowships
Foundation Directory Online (*Accesible in-person only at the Lorain Public Library) Find funding with the most comprehensive and up-to-date searchable database available for grants online.
Fractured Atlas' vision is to create a world where all artists have the tools they need to make their creative dreams a reality. The FA website is a great repository of continuously updated funding opportunities for artists.
(This is not an exhaustive list, but a sampling of high profile organizations to get started.)
In keeping with his lifelong devotion to contemporary music, Aaron Copland bequeathed to it a large part of his estate. The Fund’s purpose is to encourage and improve public knowledge and appreciation of contemporary American music.
This fund supports performing organizations, institutions, summer festivals and conferences whose artistic excellence encourages and improves public knowledge and appreciation of works by younger and relatively unknown, living American composers of classical concert music.
The American Music Project is a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting and underwriting performances of American classical music of the past as well as selectively commissioning new works from American composers.
The Amphion Foundation, founded in 1987 by Elliott and Helen Carter, encourages the performance of contemporary concert music by American composers, through support to performing and presenting organizations that demonstrate sustained artistic excellence.
Associated Chamber Music Players
The ACMP Foundation awards grants to foster the playing of chamber music by people of all ages and skill levels from all over the world. Since 1993, ACMP has awarded more than 3,000 grants totaling over $4 million for ongoing programs promoting chamber music worldwide.
Chamber Music America develops and supports an evolving chamber music field through grant programs, professional development services, and more. CMA’s programs serve ensembles, concert presenters, composers, chamber music advocates, and industry professionals.
Through the MTNA Grants program, the organization provides funding opportunities available to members, non-members alike, and affiliate organizations.
National Alliance for Audition Support
The National Alliance for Audition Support (NAAS) is an unprecedented national initiative to increase diversity in American orchestras. It does so by offering Black and Latinx musicians a customized combination of mentoring, audition preparation, financial support, and audition previews.
National Endowment for the Arts
Grants for organizations support exemplary projects in artist communities, arts education, dance, design, folk and traditional arts, literature, local arts agencies, media arts, museums, music, musical theater, opera, presenting and multidisciplinary works, theater, and visual arts.
New Music USA offers funding and development opportunities to individuals and organizations undertaking imaginative work in the field of new music.
The Individual Excellence Awards program recognizes outstanding accomplishments by artists in a variety of disciplines. Awards give artists the resources to experiment and explore their art forms, develop skills and advance their careers. Competitive applications focus on the merit of past artistic work, combined with an open panel review conducted by nationally recognized professionals. (Search for your own home state or regional city arts' council listings online.)
Over the past five decades, OPERA America has awarded $20 million to opera companies and artists across North America. Their strategic philanthropy supports new work development, audience building, civic practice, co-productions, and more.
The Presser Foundation's grantmaking opportunities serve a broad and diverse community of musicians, educators, and music lovers. The Foundation also provides financial awards to promising undergraduate students at qualified higher education institutions.
The Rachel Barton Pine Foundation’s Grants for Education and Career help cover such expenses as fees for supplemental lessons, entrance fees to competitions, audition recording sessions, travel expenses for lessons or competitions or auditions, and more.
Tuesday Musical’s annual competition is widely recognized as the best of its kind in Ohio. Since starting the competition in 1955 with support from generous donors and volunteers, Tuesday Musical has awarded nearly 700 scholarships ranging from $500 to $2,000 to talented students embarking on careers as music educators and performers.
Oberlin College Office of Fellowships and Awards
At Oberlin, the fellowships office works directly with students and alumni in support of applications to a broad range of nationally competitive programs, from astrophysics to music performance. We have a long history of successfully placing Obies in the finest, most prestigious fellowships and partner with other offices, including Career Development, to help our graduates launch into meaningful, successful careers.
The Frank Huntington Beebe Fund for Musicians
The purpose of the Fund is to provide fellowships for gifted young musicians, generally performers and composers in classical disciplines, who wish to pursue advanced music study and performance abroad.
Fulbright Programs for Artists, Writers & Musicians
The Fulbright Program is committed to providing opportunities for American and foreign artists, writers, poets, filmmakers, and musicians to showcase their creativity in many countries throughout the world.