I had two interviews - one was a general conversation with a tutor from another college, who coincidentally was a music fellow too. That was 20 minutes long and the conversation was fairly lax. It was as though we were having a dinnertime conversation. The second was with the director of studies at the college, which was slightly longer and contained tests such as aural perception and music analysis. The personal statement was discussed, albeit briefly, and then the essays I sent in were also discussed.

The first interview was a much more broad overview of music and what I thought it was all about. A few topics were extracted from my statement, but nothing major. The second interview had a lot more in-depth analysis, and we were given 10 different pieces to study an hour before the interview. We had to choose 3 and talk about them in detail. I was also asked if I wanted to perform anything on a chosen instrument, or harmonise a chorale.

There aren't that many introductory books for music, but all that there are are extremely useful - the 'very short introduction to' series, Grout and Taruskin all helped massively! My school also did mock interviews which I did one of, although that didn't help very much in hindsight as it was nothing like the real thing. My best friend is also at the same college studying the same subject the year above me so he helped me out a lot.

Don't let anyone or anything get your spirits down about how you did. I know that's really easy to say, but as soon as you have done the interviews, if you completely forget about them, the period of waiting won't be as bad, and the outcome will be a lot more gentle if it goes one way, and a lot more of a serendipitous occasion on the other!