Pick a clean template that highlights your voice work and performance history. Use a reverse-chronological layout so your most recent roles, recordings, and recitals appear first.
Keep length tight. One page works for early-career baritones and many mid-career singers. Use two pages only if you list many leading roles, recordings, or long engagement history.
Use simple, ATS-friendly fonts like Calibri, Arial, or Georgia. Set body text to 10–12pt and headers to 14–16pt. Keep line spacing around 1.0–1.15 and add margins for white space.
Structure your sections with clear headings: Contact, Professional Summary, Vocal Roles & Engagements, Recordings, Education, Coaches & Languages, Awards. Use bullets for roles and add dates, company, and venue for each line.
Aim for readable formatting. Avoid multi-column layouts, heavy graphics, or unusual fonts that ATS may misread. Keep bold, italics, and bullet styles consistent. Use plain text for dates and places.
Common mistakes to avoid: overcrowding the document, listing every minor choir gig, using color-heavy logos, and embedding images of your headshot in the text. Save a separate PDF with high quality for human review, but keep an ATS-friendly Word file for electronic applications.