Photo Credit: Family M W R via cc
As an actor it can often be really tricky finding the right piece for any audition. Here at actor hub we like to help with occasional lists of audition pieces which we know work, these are pieces we have witnessed at auditions and have been humdingers!
At a musical theatre audition it is really important that you choose a piece which not only shows off your vocal ability but more importantly which demonstrates your acting ability. If a director just wanted great singers in a show then it is unlikely they would be approached you or your agent, they would choose someone who had spent years at a classical school perfecting their voice! They want an actor who can tell a story, and show a character out there on stage, and your audition piece should do just that.
When you are presenting a song at an audition you want to know that the accompanist can play the song, so don’t choose something madly obscure or too tricky. Don’t worry yourself endlessly about choosing something which they haven’t already heard that day, yes you want to be memorable but if you sing something that your competition has just sung, don’t fret, just know that you will be interpreting it completely differently.
If you are certain that a life on the musical theatre stage is for you then you need to be building your repertoire and learning about musicals all the time. Go to shows (at present loads of fringe theatres seem to be doing musicals, so you wont have to break the bank), search youtube, visit forums, get listening on itunes. The more familiar you are with the different styles, genres and periods of musical theatre the more prepared you will be for any audition which comes your way.
Remember to be bold, be brave and to go in as an individual and make the choices you want to make. If you slip up or fail, that’s ok, laugh it off and do it in style.
Audition Songs for Men
The songs below are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to male audition songs. I have chosen these as they demonstrate both your vocal ability but also your acting skills. They should also introduce you to some songs or shows you didnt already know or that you might have overlooked. I will keep adding lists as I find new songs. If you find something else, or have a favourite you would like to share, let us know via Twitter @actorhub and we can add your choice to one of our lists.
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I Wish I Could Go Back To College (click to view video)
Avenue Q
Avenue Q is an hilarious musical which has puppets alongside actors. If you went looking for Sesame Street and got lost and ended up in the wrong neighbourhood you might just find yourself in Avenue Q!By Act Two all the characters have fallen in and out of love and like with each other and lament happier times with the terrific song I Wish I Could Go Back To College.It is easily made a solo song, and features in a number of audition song books. This number would make a great audition song, and is completely age appropriate for a younger actor who has recently graduated. Play it for the truth, not just for the funny. Really try and think of how exciting times looked when you were still at Uni and how you can look back with rose-tinted glasses on those times. Whatever you do, don’t mime that you have a puppet on one hand … play the character, not the puppet! -
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Your Song (click to view video)
Elton John
A long time favourite for male rock and pop auditions, Elton Johns Your Song found new fame in Moulin Rouge.The song is a mix of folk and jazz and the lyrics express the romantic thoughts of an innocent.If you intend to try your hand at this, or any other ‘pop’ or ‘rock’ song really take the time to work out the story, who is singing, what are they singing about. Don’t settle for doing an impression of Elton singing it, or even Ewen MacGregor in Moulin Rouge, find out your own story and characters and tell it and sing it from the heart, only then can you truly own it at an audition. -
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Being Alive (click to view video)
Company
This is one of those songs which is an audition standard, but rightly so. I think it is a perfect audition piece, a real journey of a song and a gift for any actor.Company is a Sondheim show dealing with relationships. The plot centres on Bobby, a single guy who is a commitment-phobe.Being Alive comes at the end of the show, Bobby has looked at his life and the lives of his married friends, he had thought that by marrying you would just find yourself with someone to smother you and make you feel things you don’t want to feel, but through the song he realises that only by being with someone else will he be able to find someone to help, hurt, hinder and love, someone else to help him face the challenges of Being Alive.My advice with this song is to work on it as a monologue first, find the drama, find the story find the moments of change and choice. The work on the musicality of it. Yes it has its huge vocal moments but in my mind the truth and depth is there to be played in the less showy moments. This is a song which they will have heard before, but if you can really truly act your way through it and find the truth, yours will be the performance they remember. -
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Everybody says Don’t (click to view video)
Anyone Can Whistle
Anyone Can Whistle is set in an imaginary town which has gone bankrupt. The only place which is doing well is the local sanitorium, known as ‘The Cookie Jar’.This song comes at the end of Act Two, the ‘Cookies’ have escaped and are hiding amongst the townspeople, but no one can tell who is mad and who is sane. Fay Apple a young nurse with the help of Hapgood, one of the Cookies, decide to tear up the inmates records and let them be free.The song is sung by Hapgood as the freed ‘Cookies’ dance. It is a delightful song full of careless optimism, Hapgood is an ‘idealist’ and this delight for life and opportunity shines through in this song. -
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Through Heaven’s Eyes (click to view video)
The Prince Of Egypt
The Prince of Eygpt is a 1998 animated epic from Dreamworks which tells the biblical story of Moses and the Book of Exodus. The story follows Moses from being a Prince of Eygpt through to his destiny leading the children of Isreal out of Eygpt. The songs are written by the Wicked and Godspell composer Stephen Schwartz.This wonderful uplifting song is sung by Jethro a high priest and father to Moses’ wife, Tzipporah. Moses has gone into hiding and journeyed many miles across desert ro reach the land of the Midiantes – who worship the Hebrew God.Jethro sings a song of thanks to God and welcomes Moses into the tribe. The song is a celebration of life and noticing and celebrating all that the world has to offer.Stephen Schwartz has this to say about the inspiration for this song:
That was actually the third song written for its spot the other two had more to do with the tribe welcoming Moses into their midst. It was Jeffrey Katzenberg’s suggestion that the song be more about the philosophy of Jetthro, the spiritual leader of the tribe. One of the directors, Steve Hickner, found a well known poem called “The Measure of a Man” which helped to inspire some of the specific ideas in the song.“So how can you see what your life is worth
Or where your value lies?
You can never see through the eyes of man
You must look at your life, look at your life through heaven’s eyes” -
Musical Theatre Actor Hub Advice
