FAQ myMusicAvatar

Avatars

Frequently Asked Questions

About

What is Music Avatar?

Music Avatar is an online system to upload your music online. It creates a hassle free process for the composer to submit, update, and upload a submission with confidence that the opportunity will receive it.

Music Avatar is a great way for organizations, ensembles and musicians to reliably receive submissions online.

How do I know what competitions are using Music Avatar?

Every competition or opportunity that uses Music Avatar will have a link to www.MusicAvatar.org. If you login you can view every open opportunity available in your account area by clicking the Open Opportunities tab.

User Accounts

What browsers are supported?

Users are encouraged to visit our site with a standards-compliant browser, such as Safari and Google Chrome. The site was written to conform to current web standards in HTML 5 and CSS 3.

What do I do if I can't login?

Please note that login credentials are case-sensitive and cookies must be enabled in your browser to use Music Avatar.

Forgotten your password or username? Use the password reset utility at the bottom of the Login page.

My page document expired what do I do?

If you hit the BACK button on your browser you may encounter an error that your document expired. Just refresh your browser screen and all should be well. Navigating without hitting the back or forward buttons will also avoid this problem.

How do I make my Avatar public?

To make the necessary change, follow these steps:

1) Login to musicavatar.org
2) Click your name at the top of the screen
3) Click the pencil on the page to the right of your picture
4) Change the privacy drop down to "Public"
5) IMPORTANT: Hit the "submit" button at the bottom of the page

I never changed my account but I received a message from Music Avatar that my account was edited?

Music Avatar has several layers of security for our users. If you ever suspect your account has been compromised contact us immediately.

In order to be a judge in Music Avatar certain privileges must be granted to your account to have this ability. When an administrator makes this change to your account, our system will notify you that changes have been made.

If you feel that you have been made a judge in error, please let us know by emailing support@musicavatar.org.

Submissions

How do I submit to a competition?

Entering competitions musicavatar.org is really intuitive and straightforward, but if you need a little help check out this submission tutorial.

Can I view or edit my submissions?

As long as the opportunity is still accepting submissions, you can verify, edit, and view your submission. Watch this short video to learn how:

Can I change or update my submission?

Any information you provide including uploading a new audio file or score can be done up to the deadline date of the opportunity.

The media player displays a message that my file type is not supported. What gives?

Musicavatar is designed to support HTML 5 standards where possible. Of the file types Musicavatar accepts for submissions, the HTML 5 <audio> tag only supports .mp3 and .wav. It does not support other file types such as .aif. If you see that your media file is not supported by HTML 5, please know that it has still been received and will be adjudicated. The warning message simply means that the HTML 5 media player is unable to play your audio file because it is not compatible with HTML 5. Clicking the download button will either download the file to your computer or open it up in a new tab/window and begin playing using the plugin assigned to play the .aif filetype by your browser.

I received an email saying UPLOAD PROBLEM. What do I do?

If you receive this email, something went wrong during your file upload. To see which files failed to upload and/or attempt to repair the problem, you can view and edit your submission by navigating to the appropriate opportunity using the "My Submission" menu item on the Music Avatar website.

Some things to check when facing upload problems:

• Make sure your files are of the correct type. Your audio recordings must be .wav, .aiff, or mp3 files and your score file must be a pdf file.


• Remain patient and do not hit the "Back" or "Refresh" buttons. The file uploads may take a long time depending on their size and the speed of your connection to the internet.


• Pay attention to the error message you are receiving. There will often be information there that will aid in troubleshooting your upload. The error message you received was:


ERROR: Your submission has been created but it is not complete. The audio file you uploaded is not the correct file type. The uploaded file had a mime-type of audio/x-m4a. To complete your submission, you must re-upload your file. An email has been sent you with more information and instructions.[note error #88089]


• Be advised there is a known bug in Firefox that prevents uploaded files passing the security check Music Avatar has in place. Try another browser.


• If you are unable to resolve the problem yourself, email support@voxnovus.com and please include your browser version and any other info that might assist in troubleshooting.


• Rest assured that the problem you have run into will not cause you to "miss the deadline", or negatively affect the evaluation of your submission. We are committed to making sure each submission receives the same care and consideration you have put into creating it.

Music Avatar for Judges and Organizers

How does this work?

Music Avatar does not charge composers and artists a fee to create a Music Avatar account or to submit their works to calls for works. There is a small fee to organizers who want to use Music Avatar to manage a call for submissions. Contact Robert Voisey by emailing support@MusicAvatar.org for prices and discounts.

Why use Music Avatar for a call for scores?

Music Avatar is a respected web application in the composer community. It reaches out to hundreds of composer interested in submitting their creative works to competitions and for performance considerations. Music Avatar is part of a vast network of utilities as part of Vox Novus. All calls on Music Avatar are promoted through Composers' Site and winners and selection announcements are also posted on this very popular website.

Collecting and reviewing scores and audio submissions is easy with Music Avatar. Our website and collection of tools guides composers to complete a thorough submission with all of the necessary requirements. Submissions are automatically reviewed and composers are notified about complete and incomplete entries.

Once the deadline for the opportunity call has been met, and administrator reviews the submissions and prepares the judging rounds. Judges who have registered with Music Avatar can review submissions, rate and grade them in any number of pre-selected criteria, and select candidates, semi-finalists, and finalists.

A flexible judging application allows for the selection process to happen anywhere the judges have Internet access. Selections and comments are recorded and can be reviewed and tabulated. At any time judges and administrators can download scores in pdf file format and audio files as mp3s.

Please note that Music Avatar currently does not facilitate nor advocate calls for works that charge submission or entry fees.

To learn more about Music Avatar and to find out how affordable it is to manage your next call for works, contact Robert Voisey by emailing support@MusicAvatar.org.

I am interested in using Music Avatar. How do I start?

Once you have decided to use Music Avatar for your call for scores and have paid the service fee, you will need to assign an administrator for your opportunity project. The administrator needs to register at Music Avatar and send the text of the call to Robert Voisey at support@MusicAvatar.org. The text of the call will be reviewed and entered into the database and set up for your approval.

Things to consider in your call for submissions:

• Do you want to make the judging process anonymous? If so Judges will not see submission identities. (As long as no indication is made on the score or audio.) Administrators can not be anonymous.
• Who is administering the call? Any additional Contact Names?
• Who is the call open to? Are there any limiting factors for the applicants?
• Is there a fee? Music Avatar currently is not supporting nor advocating submission or entry fees.
• Is there a prize for being selected? If so what is it?
• Currently, Music Avatar only processes digital online submissions.
• What is your deadline or expiration for the call.
• How many submissions are allowed per applicant account? Music Avatar does not take responsibility for false information provided by applicants nor duplicate accounts made under false pretenses.
• The maximum length you need for applicant biographies.
• The maximum length you need for applicant for program notes.
• The maximum length you need for applicant for performance requirements.

You should have an idea of what type of judging process you would like to implement. Most often a score 1-10 and a comments section for one round is all that is necessary; however, many other formats can be accommodated. All of your judges should have registered to Music Avatar before the judging process.

I am and administrator and I just edited my opportunity but it show up as an available opportunity?

When you first add or edit any call in Music Avatar, the opportunity is placed an "unpublished" state. After creating or editing an opportunity, you must change the state of the opportunity to published.

I'm a judge. How do I begin?

Please consult the following video: