How to Work With an Audition Accompanist: Marking Music and Giving the Tempo

They call your name. You walk in, smile at the table, and then you have to do the part nobody rehearses: cross to the piano, open your binder, and explain your song to a stranger who has never seen your cut and is about to play it.

Most singers spend weeks on the song and none on that conversation. So the pianist gets a crowded page, a vague “it’s kind of medium,” and a snap of the fingers, and the first eight bars arrive at a speed you’ve never sung. You spend the rest of the song catching up instead of acting it.

The short version: bring a clean, taped, complete copy in a binder, with the start, the end, and every tempo change marked so a sight-reader sees them in one glance. At the piano, say the song, where it starts and ends, and how it begins, in one breath. Give the tempo by singing a bar or two of a steady section at your real speed. If the tempo is wrong early, stop politely and give it again; if it’s late, keep going and, where the style allows, lead with your voice.

Know who’s sitting at the piano

The audition pianist is not there to judge you, but they are on your side of the table for the next minute or so, and they’re tired. Thomas Griep, a Los Angeles pianist and conductor, notes that “It is not uncommon for a pianist to play 400+ songs in a day.” Your song is one of those, played from your page, probably at sight.

That changes what “good preparation” means. It isn’t a beautifully annotated score. It’s a page a tired, skilled musician can read cold, plus about twenty seconds of clear instructions. Everything in this guide serves that goal.

It also means the pianist is a person, so treat them like one. Say hello. Michael Radi, a musical director and vocal coach who plays piano for singers, puts it simply: “Piano people are (generally) not scary.” A friendly, efficient minute at the piano is the easiest good impression you will make all day.

Prepare a binder a stranger can sight-read

Before any marking, get the physical copy right. Lawrence University’s instructions for preparing music for your accompanist are a model:

• Check that every copy is complete, with no piano notes cut off at the top, bottom, or sides by the copier.
• Copy one-sided, then tape the sheets back-to-back at the corners. No staples.
• Keep the odd-numbered pages on the right, the way the printed book has them, so page turns fall where the arranger planned.
• If the song is two pages, set them side by side so there’s no page turn at all.
• Put the pages in a three-ring binder you use only for auditions, with your name and phone number inside.

Indiana University of Pennsylvania’s audition guidelines add the goal behind all of this: a binder “with the fewest page turns.” Every turn is a moment the pianist takes a hand off the keys.

Sheet protectors: the one thing pianists disagree on

Lawrence asks singers not to use clear plastic sleeves, because they cause glare under lights and the pianist can’t pencil anything in. Griep says that if you use protectors, choose non-glare ones. Radi dislikes them for the glare, “but many people like them.” If you use them, buy the matte kind. If you don’t, tape and a sturdy binder do the job.

Last, have the song in the key you sing it in. Oakland University’s theatre audition guide asks for “sheet music in the correct key with all cuts or repetitions clearly marked.” Don’t ask the pianist to transpose on the spot. If you need it lower, get a printed copy in your key.

Mark the music for one glance, not a long read

Choosing and counting the cut is its own job; our guide to cutting 16 or 32 bars walks through it. Here, the question is how the finished cut looks on the page, because the pianist will look at it for a few seconds before you sing.

Lawrence’s rule is a good filter: erase everything the pianist doesn’t need (your diction notes, breathing reminders to yourself, translations), and keep breath marks, tempo changes, and cuts clearly marked. Jose Simbulan, writing in BroadwayWorld, adds that simple beats loud. Heavy highlighting and big arrows distract; a pencil and a straight edge are often enough.

What the page needs, in roughly the order the pianist’s eye will find it:

1. The tempo, written at the top of the first page as a reference, even if the original marking is buried later in the song. Don’t rely on it; you’ll still sing it.
2. A clear start (a simple bracket works) and a note on how you begin: a full intro, the last bar before your entrance, or just your starting note.
3. The key and time signatures, circled, and written in by hand if your cut starts mid-song where the printed ones don’t appear.
4. Any cut inside the song, shown with a single clean line through the bars you skip.
5. Every tempo change, key change, slowdown, held note, or pause, marked where it happens.
6. A clear end, marked as plainly as the start.

That starting note is called a bell tone: the pianist plays your first note, alone, and you come in. It’s the fastest way into a song, and it needs a word on the page (“bell tone”) so the pianist doesn’t play the full intro by habit. Repeat signs and codas deserve special care. If your cut jumps, draw the path so it reads like one continuous road.

Then test the page on someone who can play. Hand it to a pianist friend or a coach, say nothing, and watch where they hesitate. Every hesitation is a mark to fix.

What to say at the piano

Walk straight to the pianist. Joel Decandio, a Broadway collaborative pianist, offers a script for exactly this moment: say hello and the song, then “We start here, cut here, and we end here,” then the tempo. He suggests the whole exchange can take under twenty seconds.

Point to each place as you say it, so the pianist’s eyes follow your finger. If the title isn’t on the first page, name the song and the show. For a pop song, the artist helps. Radi adds the detail people forget: tell the pianist how you start, whether that’s an intro, a bell tone, or the first few notes, and do it “before you walk away.”

If you’re singing two songs, brief one at a time. Griep advises going back to the piano after the first song to set up the second (key, start, stop, cuts) rather than explaining both at once. Two sets of instructions in one breath means one gets lost. Griep also suggests having at least one contrasting backup song ready and knowing where it is in your binder, since the panel may ask for it.

What not to say: a long apology for your copy, a story about the song, or a question like “Do you know this one?” Even if they do, they may know a different version. Simbulan’s advice for a page problem is the same as for everything here: don’t apologize, fix it quickly and quietly.

Give the tempo by singing it

This is the moment that matters most. The tempo you wrote at the top of the page is a reference, not the instruction. A tempo word on its own doesn’t work; Decandio points out that “allegro” covers a wide range of speeds. Kyle Branzel, a Broadway coach in New York City, sums up his approach as “If it’s your song, it’s your tempo,” and in his series on giving a tempo lays out a three-step method: point, sing, tap.

• Point to the bars you’re about to sing, so the pianist can match the notes to what they hear.
• Sing a short stretch quietly, at full speed. Branzel’s advice is to pick a steady section, like the chorus, not a free or rubato passage, and to sing it as written, without the stylized phrasing you’ll use in performance.
• Tap the beat while you sing, so the pianist hears the pulse, not just the melody.

Decandio explains why the beat matters: singing without it gives the pianist only “a very nebulous idea of the tempo.” Pianists don’t agree on how to show it, though. Branzel taps on his chest; Radi asks singers to refrain from snapping, foot-tapping, or chest-thumping, and prefers a little movement of the body with the beat. Neither recommends snapping. A quiet tap of your fingers on your leg, or a small nod, sits between the two.

Beware the adrenaline tempo

Here’s the trap. As Branzel puts it, “Nerves will push your tempo faster than you intend.” Radi notices the same thing from the bench: singers who feel awkward singing quietly to the pianist tend to rush. So before you sing those two bars, pause, hear the song in your head at the speed you rehearsed, and only then open your mouth.

Practice this at home. Set a metronome to your real tempo, turn it off, wait ten seconds, and sing your two bars. Then turn it on and check. You may be surprised how far you drift when you are excited.

When the tempo goes wrong

It will happen. A good pianist will usually listen to you in the first bars; Jenna Simeonov, a pianist and vocal coach, writes that “A good pianist will pay attention to the breath you take before your first phrase.” Take that breath in your tempo, and you’ve already told them again.

If the intro or the first phrase is clearly off, stop. Branzel’s advice in part three of his series is to stop early, politely and cleanly, and he says the first third of the song is fine. Smile, say “Sorry, could we try that once more?”, walk back to the piano, point, sing, and tap again, and start over. Branzel’s view is that no one docks you points for it; they notice how you handle it.

In the last few bars, Branzel’s line is to let it go; restarting late muddies the impression you’ve already made. Between the first third and the end is a judgment call: if you can live with the tempo, keep going and lead with your voice. Simeonov’s point is that the only way to change a tempo the pianist has set is to sing at a different tempo, and Radi agrees: “Best way to lead a good accompanist is with your voice.”

Sing clearly on the beat you want, especially at the start of phrases, and a good pianist will usually follow. Branzel’s caveat: in groove-based styles, the pianist is trained to lock the groove, so pushing or pulling the tempo may not work. Many pop and rock songs fall in that group.

Keep any gesture small, because the song is for the panel, not the piano. And never glare at the pianist. A glare, which Radi answers with “Oh please do not,” makes you look harder to work with than any tempo problem could. If it was the pianist’s mistake, he adds, they already feel terrible.

When you finish, don’t apologize, wince, or explain. Griep’s advice is not to react, apologize, or roll your eyes, because the panel may have liked what they heard. Then thank the pianist on your way out.

Get the acting ready too

A clean binder and a clear tempo buy you something: a whole cut where you aren’t fighting the music. Use them to act. Speak the lyric of your cut as a monologue first, so you know who you’re talking to and what you want by the last word. Our guide on how to act a song goes deeper.

Many musical calls also ask for sides, and those deserve the same care as the song. Offbook helps with that half: upload the sides, choose your role, and realistic voices read the other characters, then wait while you say your lines and play the next cue when you finish. Arriving off book on the scene frees you to put your attention on the room, and on the person at the piano.

The night-before checklist

1. Every copy is complete, taped back-to-back at the corners, odd pages on the right, in a binder.
2. The song is printed in the key you sing it in.
3. The tempo is written at the top of the first page.
4. Start and end are bracketed, with “bell tone” or the intro you want written at the start.
5. Cuts, tempo changes, held notes, and key changes are marked cleanly, and nothing else is.
6. A friend who plays has read the page cold and found nothing confusing.
7. You’ve rehearsed your twenty-second briefing out loud.
8. You’ve practiced singing two bars at tempo from silence, then checked them against a metronome.
9. You know where your backup song is in the binder.

For the rest of what goes in your bag, see our list of what to bring to an audition.

Questions actors ask

Can I sing a cappella if I don’t trust the pianist?

Often not. IUP’s guidelines, for example, rule out a cappella singing. Prepare the page and the briefing well, and trust the pianist.

Should I bring a lead sheet instead of the full piano music?

Bring the full piano part whenever it exists. A lead sheet gives only the melody and chord symbols, so the pianist has to invent an accompaniment at sight, and the result may sound different from the song you rehearsed. For musical theater songs, look for the published vocal selections or the piano-vocal score.

What if the pianist asks me a question about my music?

Good. Answer it briefly and specifically, and point to the page. A question means they’re reading carefully. If they suggest a simpler way to handle a tricky spot, it’s often worth taking; they know what’s easy to play at sight.

How should I give the tempo for a ballad with a free opening?

Pull the tempo from the first steady section, not the free part. Tell the pianist the opening is free and you’ll lead it, point to where the steady tempo begins, and sing and tap a bar or two from there. Mark the free bars clearly, so the pianist knows to follow your breath.