Auditioning the Audition Process
The screened audition (AKA “the twelve-minute shoot-out”) has become a hallowed rite of passage for orchestra musicians all over the world. But does it really work? Is the candidate left standing after all those impossible solo bits of Wagner, Strauss and Debussy really the best person to fill a job that’s all about working with other people?
Not many orchestra musicians have experience with being hired into high-skill positions other than playing in an orchestra, so it is not surprising that we often overlook just how different our hiring processes look than those in other high-skill occupations. Surgeons are not hired after a 12-minute demonstration of their surgical skills. Airline pilots are not hired after performing one take-off into a hurricane and one landing with three engines out. Quartet violists are not hired after anonymously playing three famous viola quartet passages all by themselves. Positions like these are generally filled only after multiple interviews, examination of candidates’ previous work, resume and reference checking, and extensive personality testing.
There are European orchestras that do things differently. Vienna, for example, has a long-standing practice of hiring musicians largely from the Viennese tradition of orchestra playing, while many orchestras in countries formerly behind the Iron Curtain retained their individual character through the inability to hire from beyond their region or their traditions.
Yet most musicians hired by American orchestras get tenure and contribute to their orchestras playing at a very high level. Does the process need fixing? Should we look more at ensemble skills? Should we be devoting more than 10 minutes to the average candidate? Should a trial period in the orchestra be a part of every audition? If so, how should it be structured? And does the tenure process work well enough in fixing hiring mistakes made by music directors and audition committees?
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