Professional Opportunities

The music industry has changed significantly in recent years, which is why we’ll always encourage you to look beyond your studies.

With a growing trend towards portfolio careers, we want to ensure that you gain an all-round experience while you’re with us. This is why we offer a range of professional and Performance Opportunities to help you develop the skills needed to establish and maintain a successful future in a competitive sector.

Students dressed in suits play trumpets during a performance.

All RNCM students can audition for a place on one of our highly regarded Professional Experience Schemes for the chance to work with a number of renowned orchestras and arts organisations worldwide, and every undergraduate will undertake at least one Work Experience Placement during their studies.

These placements are across the industry and include everything from performing and teaching to arts administration, marketing, and education projects in schools, hospitals and care homes. Our in-house Artist Agency team also source and coordinate over 350 paid external performance opportunities for RNCM students annually.

Two RNCM students play a flute and clarinet respectively.

Some students have the opportunity to tour overseas during their course. For example, our Symphony Orchestra has travelled to Italy to take part in Montepulciano’s Cantiere Internazionale d’Arte for almost 20 years and our Big Band has participated in the Malta International Arts Festival and presented workshops and concerts in Changzhou, China. Collaborations also provide valuable opportunities for performance in other countries. Popular music students have worked with peers from partner institutions in Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Valencia for an exciting initiative called Interplay, and in 2018 over 100 classical musicians joined forces with students from the Paris Conservatoire for a series of concerts in Manchester, London and Paris to mark the end of the First World War.

Added to this, current students can apply for paid work via our Student Ambassador Scheme, which offers the chance to support our Marketing and Student Recruitment team in promoting the work we do to prospective students. Each year all students can also pitch their own project ideas to a panel of business and industry experts in the hope of securing an RNCM Creative Innovators Award.

Click on the links below to learn more about our professional opportunities and partners: