Bruch for Orchestral Auditions?

January 3, 2012 at 11:19 PM · Did you ask them for the list of repertoire and excerpts for audition?

January 4, 2012 at 01:00 AM · Always pick something you can actually play. I remember chatting with a principal viola player after he'd been listening to auditions, and he was bemoaning all the prospects who, as he put it, proved that they couldn't play the Walton. "I'm not interested in hearing what they can't play. I'll find that out in the sight-reading" And as an afterthought - "And if they could play the Walton, they CERTAINLY wouldn't get the job!"

January 4, 2012 at 02:37 AM · Bruch too easy? Hardly! It may not be as hard as Brahms, Tchaikovsky or Sibelius, but it's still a major concerto. Glenn Dicterow loves to play it! And it's not WHAT you play; it's HOW you play, as has already been pointed out. Good solid Mozart - not that THAT is easy - makes an infinitely better impression than struggling Brahms or Paganini.

January 4, 2012 at 06:28 AM · A cellist friend of mine played the Saint-Saëns during his audition with the Cleveland symphony. I don't know enough about the cello to say if this compares with the Bruch violin concerto, but according to him all of the other finalists were playing concerti that were significantly harder. My friend won the audition. He played something that he KNEW he could play at a professional level.