I know a lot of folks reading this blog may already know about orchestra auditions, but if you aren’t a musician, you might be curious.  How does somebody get a job in a symphony orchestra?  In some cities, this is a decent paying full time position.  In other cities, it is not a full time position (or is perhaps a very poor paying full time position.)  Most of the players have degrees in music performance from major conservatories such as the Juilliard School of Music or (my alma mater) the Cleveland Institute of Music.  Some are not from conservatories, but very few do not have performance degrees, usually not only a bachelor’s degree but also a master’s or perhaps further professional degrees.

Let me give you a brief rundown on how one gets a job in a symphony orchestra.

The orchestra announces an opening in the trade paper.  If you are interested, you send in your resume.  They decide whether to invite you or not (different orchestras have different standards).  If you are invited, they send you a list of the pieces to learn, known as the “audition list”.  Usually you have to learn several movements of concertos, some other solo pieces perhaps, and a lot of different parts from the orchestral repertoire (known as “excerpts”).  This list can range from 15 to 20 minutes worth of music to several hours worth.  Then you must learn all the pieces on the list.  Many you may already know, but you must learn them ridiculously well (as close to perfect as possible).  Any mistake could cost you the audition.  But yet, you must also play in a style that makes people want to vote for you (yes, this is decided by a committee of members of the orchestra plus the conductor).  It is nearly impossible to figure out what that style might be, and yet you must try.  You must strive for perfect intonation, rhythm, beautiful tone quality, a pleasing sound, lovely dynamic contrast, nice phrasing, clear articulations.  It helps if you have a very fine (perhaps costing over $100,000 for a violin) instrument.

{Before that, you probably started playing your instrument at the age of 3, 4 or 5.  You spent hours each day in your childhood to adolescence practicing your instrument, perfecting your skills.  You spent your summers at music festivals and schools.  You spent your weekends playing with ensembles or traveling for workshops or youth orchestra.  You spent your afternoons practicing or at lessons.  Your entire childhood is likely defined by your instrument.  By the time you reach college, you (ideally) have already spent 10,000 hours practicing.  If not, by the time you finish college you should have, or else (and I’m being brutally honest here) you have no shot of making a career out of music performance.  Most people spend at least 5 years practicing 3 to 6 hours a day, if not 10 or 15 years.  Some people keep this up for decades.  Most people do not get a job in a major symphony.}

For each audition advertised, probably 100 to 500 people send in resumes.  Then perhaps, 20 to 80 actually take the audition.  To take an audition, you pay your own way there, you pay transportation, hotel, and food.  You show up at your appointed (randomly, perhaps) time, and you play a few things from the audition list, maybe five minutes worth, maybe more, maybe less.  Likely the audition will be a blind audition (behind a screen) so nobody knows who you are.  If you play well enough to stick out from the crowd, you might get advanced from the first round (perhaps 1 in 6 to 10 do).  If not, you go home and try again next time–tired, poorer, but hopefully a little wiser.  If you make it past the first round, you will play again, usually the same day, but sometimes the next day or perhaps you have to make another trip.  This second trip COULD be reimbursed, but not always.  (At least this is all tax-deductible).  Sometimes after the second round a winner is chosen, but more often there is another round.  Perhaps now only 2 to 3 people are remaining.

And out of those remaining people, there is no guarantee a winner will be chosen.  Too often the committee decides no one from the final round is qualified to play in the orchestra.

This is what Chris and I have been going through for the past 10 years or so.  I won an audition for a job in the Charlotte Symphony 10 years ago.  I was chosen from about 30, after two rounds only.  I played there for two years before deciding to leave for a wide variety of reasons.  Chris won an audition for a one-year position in the symphony here, which has led to 4 one year positions, but none of them are permanent.  I am out of the “audition circuit” at this time, as I feel his chances are better and my talents do lie more with teaching (also, in any relationship there must be compromise, plus I am too injury prone to really put in the time and effort involved to win a major audition, sadly).  But he is still in it.  It is hard.  And then, even if you are lucky enough to get a job (and yes, there is a large element of luck involved in addition to ridiculous amounts of hard work), in this economy there is no guarantee that the orchestra won’t go under!

Why do we do it?  Well…what ELSE would we do??

That’s my answer to anybody who wants to go into music for a career.  If you can think of something else you’d rather do, please go do that. It’s just not worth it otherwise.

You won’t love what you do most days, but sometimes you will love it so much that all the pain and suffering is worthwhile.