Klarinet Archive - Posting 000606.txt from 1996/03

From: Neil Leupold <nleupold@-----.EDU>
Subj: Re: Non-performance majors in college ensembles?
Date: Sun, 24 Mar 1996 10:38:35 -0500

It depends on the music school/department, their political climate, and
their philosophy. Many schools of music operate on a hierarchical basis,
where those music majors who are highest up the academic-units ladder are
given priority in the assignment of parts (the logic being that they are
the closest to graduating and are therefore entitled to more frequent
playing opportunities). It goes down from there. Next in line are the
"younger" music majors (lower on the units ladder), followed by the best
of the non-performance majors (who are typically only used in a pinch,
when there happens to be a dearth of music majors available for a
particular piece).

Other schools base assignments solely on merit (performance ability). In
the former case, you will have to take an audition, but preference will
still be given to the "older" music majors, regardless of how well you
audition. If the assignments are merit-based rather than hierarchically based,
however, then you stand a good chance of being allowed to play in the ensembles
if your playing is comparable (or superior) to that of the field of players
with whom you're competing.

In both of the above cases, the situation is different between orchestra
and wind ensemble. If there aren't many clarinet players at the school,
then you will very likely be given opportunities to perform with the wind
ensemble because the music very often demands an augmented clarinet
section. In orchestra, however, the number of parts is usually confined
to the standard configuration of 2 soprano clarinets, maybe an Eb, and
maybe a bass clarinet (sometimes doubling 3rd clarinet). Naturally, the
competition for orchestra parts is much stiffer than for wind ensemble parts.

Neil

On Sat, 23 Mar 1996, Nate Burk wrote:

> I've already decided that I could never survive as a performance major in
> college -- my interests lie in biology. I still plan to study clarinet
> through college, however, which means I'd be hoping to play in college wind
> ensembles/orchestras. Can anyone out there tell me if my chances of getting
> into these groups are limited if I'm not a performance major?
>
> --Nate
>
>
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> nathan@-----.com/~nathan
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