Very interesting and thought-provoking article in the new "Senza Sordino" which pertains to many of the issues recently discussed on these boards. Go to www.icsom.org to read it. (Click on "Publications", then "Senza Sordino" and scroll down. The title is "What's Happening to the Audition System?").

very well put article!!! i was just saying the other day to my former teacher in the cleveland orchestra, that i don't get these 'trial' weeks with orchestras. how can you tell about someone's playing in just a week? what if you get a concert that doesn't show everything you can do? how can you tell if their personality fits the section by meeting them for a week (especially if everyone is on their best behavior)? this sort of thing happened in cincy for the assoc./Eb position and prinicpal oboe position. a young woman won the audition (actually both), had a trial, then wasn't hired. i'm glad for the guy(s) who did win, but shouldn't your trial be the two years probation period to see how you've matured into that position? i don't get it......

I thought this was an absolutely fabulous article. One thing I really liked was the idea that players, if properly supported and guided, usually grow within the structure of a group. The current practice of trial weeks, with and without auditions, is a very slippery slope. While in theory, they can be helpful, in reality they introduce so many additional politics, as well as quite possibly undermining the intentions of the audition commitee and music director. Auditions should mean something, and it doesn't serve anyone's interest to treat candidates disrespectfully. Many good players avoid certain orchestras, due to less than kosher hiring practices. The fact is, these are orchestras who are notorious for wasting people's money and time and allowing politics to get in the way of good music.

Bravo and well put to Ms. Douvas. There are many great players that do well in auditions and the committee just doesn't want to take the plunge!! I try to see potential and playing skill, the rest is just a learning curve. If you are an insensitive lout, you will be found out if not then you are in. Too many orchestras involve themselves with politics and individual agendas when the screen comes up. The conductor has too much power too but that is another post. One vote for one person, period.

V. Ellin

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Originally posted by carusoclarinet:
very well put article!!! i was just saying the other day to my former teacher in the cleveland orchestra, that i don't get these 'trial' weeks with orchestras. how can you tell about someone's playing in just a week? what if you get a concert that doesn't show everything you can do? how can you tell if their personality fits the section by meeting them for a week (especially if everyone is on their best behavior)? this sort of thing happened in cincy for the assoc./Eb position and prinicpal oboe position. a young woman won the audition (actually both), had a trial, then wasn't hired. i'm glad for the guy(s) who did win, but shouldn't your trial be the two years probation period to see how you've matured into that position? i don't get it......

i agree about trial weeks under different repertoire, although it's understandable that an orchestra shouldn't be expected to repeat the same repertoire for 3 finalists. but that's what i thought a trial period was for too. I also don't understand a lot of this either.

As far as the article, it's nice to see a high level orchestra have a "fair-&-square" set-up, & I wish more would stick with this. I was reading the 1st article & also don't think classical music, or the music industry, is totally dying because of the digital age, but it is always changing. Downloads & streams have definitely helped me get introduced to pieces I ordinarily would have have a hard time finding on cd, or haven't even heard at all.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: orchdork,

A trial period is to see how a player will fit into the job. With a changing repertoire every week, obviously we have to fit in different players on different repertoire only when the MD is present. And we have to work with everybody's schedules which include the candidate and our own repertoire (e.g. is this week's rep tour rep? If so, we can't use that week).

You can make the argument that an orchestra should just hire someone and give them two years. But if you can spot something in someone's playing in a week that you a)don't like or b) really like, why make them go through the torture of two years only to let them go? Believe me, it is no fun if someone doesn't get tenure after playing with the orchestra. It is painful for everyone. This is a situation we absolutely try to avoid. The more information you can have about a player before extending them a contract, the better. Obviously, you are never 100% sure, but if you can learn more about a player than just hearing them play excerpts in a vacuum, why not use it?

If I were up for a job, I would much rather play a trial week and see how it goes than go through the trouble of moving myself and my family, leaving a tenured job and then not getting tenure in my new orchestra. How horrible would that be? I would much rather not get the job in the first place. But that's just me.

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If I were up for a job, I would much rather play a trial week and see how it goes than go through the trouble of moving myself and my family, leaving a tenured job and then not getting tenure in my new orchestra. How horrible would that be? I would much rather not get the job in the first place.

It is a situation which is to be avoided as much as possible. I've heard recently of a string player in a major orchestra who was not given tenure despite glowing interim reviews which led this person to resign from their old position. Now they are without a position - this is the worst of all possible outcomes - no one has the outcome they want.

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Originally posted by Charles Noble: I've heard recently of a string player in a major orchestra who was not given tenure despite glowing interim reviews which led this person to resign from their old position. Now they are without a position - this is the worst of all possible outcomes - no one has the outcome they want.

This is sort of O/T, but since the topic came up- one of the things in this biz that makes my head explode from cognitive dissonance, is that orchestras typically give one-year leaves, while many orchestras have longer tenure processes. Certainly people take leaves for a variety of reasons, but I would bet good money that well over 50% of leaves are for a safety-net while trying out a new job. If the time length doesn't match, why bother?

And before someone points out how one can usually tell how the tenure process is going after a year (and keep in mind, most orchestras want to know if you're coming back only 6 or 7 months into the season), this example Mr Noble mentions is certainly not the only time I've heard of someone being told everything was going fine only to not get tenure in the end.

It would be good for orchestras to standardize the process by which musicians move from job to job, which would help both the musicians and management. A musician doesn't want to be in the lurch and the orchestra the musician is leaving doesn't want to be left in the lurch (since typically the musician will say they are coming back until the last possible moment, wanting to buy as much time as possible into the tenure process).

The MET system is IMHO the gold standard. I'm sure once in a while they pick a dud, but over the years this system has also hired John Ferrillo and Riccardo Morales.

But my big gripe about the "nobody is good enough" or "won't fit in" is that a lot of it comes down to who the audition committees are putting into the finals. Surely in a mass audition you have plenty of people capable of fitting in, with good sound, rhythm, intonation, etc. If you're not getting those people in the finals, maybe it's the audition committee not listening well in the earlier round, or being too aggressive about using every possible opportunity to weed people out (though I can appreciate that listening attentively to 100 people or so in the first round can be tough). I like her point that if you know there are known quantities automatically passed on to later rounds, it reduces the incentive to listen hard in the first round. At the MET they know that even the superstars are starting out equal with everyone else. And the guaranteed hire also means that no superstar aspiring for a MET job can skip the audition and hope to get invited later to try out.

Amen No shanaghans at the MET. No 5 years and numerous auditions without a hire. No nepotism or bias either. Unfortunately, it is hard to have a gold standard if it is not adopted more widely.

Well, the system is not necessarily what works; after all, humans are on both sides of the screen. Kansas City Symphony has a similar all-rounds-screened procedure that has yielded several no-hires for principal viola recently.