Chicago Bass Ensemble

Context:

My audition date for the Lyric Opera orchestra is coming up in 14 days. I’m going to share some thoughts – five minutes at a time. I have a lot of practicing to do, so five minutes a day is all I want to spare. Background: the upcoming audition is for a regular spot in the orchestra of the Lyric Opera of Chicago. It’s one of the best opera organizations in the world, and it would be a plum of a gig for any musician. I have only a few days left to prepare.

So each of those next days, I’m going to use this blog platform to share some of what I’m putting myself through. Today is two installments: this five minutes of context, and five minutes of “what I’m feeling today.” That will be my rule: five minutes. Minimal editing. Off it goes into the aether.

(I’ve got almost two minutes left…) I’d love to get this gig, but I’m realistic: after I absolutely wiped out in last weekend’s substitute list audition for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, I will be relieved to just get past the required solo piece in the Lyric audition. But wow, winning this spot … I could actually play music for a living. I long for such a life.

That’s my first five minutes for today. Back to practicing, with another five minutes blogging to follow below.

2015 November 15

Okay, it’s the end of the day (8:30 pm). I didn’t keep track of how many hours I spent today, but it really was the better part of the day. I believe that I played nearly every one of the 23 excerpts twice today. And when I say “played” I actually mean played, worked on and played again. Really, it feels like a good day of work.

I had a coaching a few weeks ago with Michael Hovnanian, and he said something to the effect of “don’t waste your time panicking now, there will be plenty of time for that right before you go on stage for your audition.” I LOVE that idea, and today is a day when it’s comfortable to feel that. I did get some stuff DONE today. It’s not always that way.

(I’m about halfway through my 5 minutes.)

Today I did manage to start something that I should have been doing all along: keeping track of my ‘current best’ tempo for each of the excerpts. Tracking that will allow me to be more deliberate about my preparation. Should’ve been doing it all along. And from now, also something I should have been doing all along, always a metronome as I go through excerpts. As you might expect where there are tricky passages, inconsistent tempo is troubling me throughout.

I thought that I would be writing something more philosophical right now, but I guess I’m on enough of a practice high that I just feel good. So that’s my five minute blog for tonight.

Tags: audition, Chicago Symphony, Lyric Opera, Michael Hovnanian

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 15th, 2015 at 8:42 pm and is filed under Getting It Done, Performance Preparation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.