Throughout the years, I’ve seen more than a few threads inquiring on the veracity of various all-national orchestras while doing my own research on which ones to try out for.
This thread is an evaluation of those programs, from my experience talking with friends and colleagues who have participated in said programs, as well as my own experience in the programs. This is based on personal experience and word of mouth mostly, so take what is written with a grain of salt. Nevertheless, I think it will be very helpful for students deciding which national-level orchestras to apply to.
This thread mostly applies to string instrumentalists, per my own experience with the high-school music scene.
Information given in said format:
x. Name of program
When/Requirements
Difficulty of getting in
Perceived reputation
Cost incurred
Pros
Cons
ASTA National High School Honors Orchestra
Held every two years, open to 11th and 12th graders
Difficulty Level: Moderately Difficult
Reputation: Good
Cost: Paid by attendee
Pros: A good all-around national-level orchestra to try for and get in; ASTA is well-regarded
Cons: Many students are not the best of the best
NAfME All-National Honor Orchestra
Held every year, open to 10th - 12th graders
Difficulty Level: Moderate - Moderately Difficult
Reputation: Good
Cost: Paid by attendee
Pros: Good all-around national-level orchestra; NAfME is well-regarded
Cons: Many students are not the best of the best
Carnegie Hall's National Youth Orchestra
Held every summer, open to non-conservatory students aged 16-19
Difficulty Level: Very Difficult
Reputation: Excellent
Cost: All expenses paid
Pros: Extremely high level; run by Carnegie Hall; conductor, soloists, and coaches are top-notch (Gergiev, Gil Shaham, Dutoit, etc.); get to tour; FREE
Cons: Very difficult to get in; occurs during summer when one might like to do other activities
Music For All's Honor Orchestra of America
Held every year, open to high-schoolers
Difficulty Level: Easy Moderate - Moderate
Reputation: Meh - Okay
Cost: Paid by attendee
Pros: Get to have the "national-orchestra" experience; wonderful conductor (Larry Livingston)
Cons: Attendees are vastly not the best musicians; lukewarm reputation
Honors Performance Series at Carnegie Hall
Held every year, open to high-schoolers
Difficulty Level: Easy Moderate - Moderate
Reputation: Meh - Okay
Cost: Paid by attendee
Pros: Get to play in Carnegie Hall
Cons: Often derided as a "money-maker" due to its very high cost
Well, that’s all I can think of. Feel free to give any personal insights into the above programs or challenge anything I’ve written in the discussion below; I wish you luck with your endeavors applying to the above orchestras!
Nice list eveningglory. FYI, ASTA’s national high school honors orchestra is no more - the last one was in 2014, and it has been discontinued (I think essentially folded into NAfME’s program). I agree that Carnegie Hall’s NYO-USA is in a different league. NAfME’s is a solid "national youth orchestra but a tier below. Music for All and Honors Performance Seires are a step down from NAfME,
The Carnegie Hall NYO-USA is on a level with the top youth orchestras in the country IMO, with the big regional ones like New York Youth Symphony and the Seattle Youth Symphony (and there are others, I named those because I am familiar with them). Another one (that technically isn’t a youth orchestra per se) is the New York String Orchestra Seminar that meets in December over the Christmas holidays, they play 2 concerts at Carnegie Hall and have chamber ensembles and coaching, as well as the concerts themselves. It is very difficult to get into, and is a fully free to those who get accepted. The downer is the kids will be in NYC over the Christmas holiday, I think it runs this year from the 19th to the 28th and they recruit kids from all over the country for it I believe.
You didn’t mention BUTI Tanglewood Young Artists Orchestra (YAO) and Interlochen World Youth Symphony Orchestra (WYSO), both are very good national (or international) summer orchestras for high school students. The Tanglewood Young Artists Orchestra is a very competitive program with merit scholarship opportunity.
THE National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America, (NYO-USA), Sponsored by Carnegie Hall, is THE most legit one. The best of the best do it, plus even the pre-college conservatory kids are allowed to audition. You also have a world-class conductor leading you, and you are literally surrounded by incredibly talented kids. The audition process is also very extensive. – Whereas stuff like NAFME only allow people who did their all-state festival to audition for it.
Also, NYO-USA is an entire month; It is a transformative experience , like meadowmount, and its free!
In terms of college applications haha… Almost every kid I know who got into NYO-USA and applied to Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, or Brown, Got in. And that’s like over 20 kids. It is Extremely attractive on your resume.
I’m not sure about the others, but in my opinion, and it’s easy to see for yourself, NYO-USA has the best of the best musicians and provides one of the best experiences you can have as a high school musician. Plus it is insane on your resume.
I don’t think so. But, most BUTI Tanglewood Orchestra kids go professional music. In fact, many of these kids were already admitted to music schools/conservatories before they attended the BUTI orchestra.
Not all NYO-USA kids go professional but some (the minority) do. Since kids who do like Julliard Pre-College, aka who are likely to go on to music in their careers, are allowed to audition, I’m sure (and know) some that will continue onto music school.
Most others will certainly keep music as a hobby or even minor, as i’m sure most love music enough (or else they wouldn’t audition in the first place) to keep it close to heart for the rest of their lives.
It is hard to know with the NYO-USA how many of the kids will go into music professionally, since it is so new, it doesn’t have a track record yet to be able to determine that. It is a relatively high level orchestra, though I suspect that with the college aged kids not being allowed to be a music major, it may not be as high level as for example something like the Juilliard college orchestra (the top level one), but it still will be one of the top youth orchestra programs in this country.
In terms of BUTI, while there have been a number of kids who go through that who end up becoming professional musicians, to say most will go professional is a major overstatement. The BUTI program is designed for talented high school musicians, and it is pretty high level and is a great program. However, the reality is that a lot of those students are doing music but don’t intend to do it professionally, many of the kids there simply like doing music, and may keep playing music in college, but don’t intend to ever become a professional musician. Some of the kids there are likely doing music because they (and their parents) believe that doing music is a great EC to get into an elite college. Put it this way, it is likely at any high school level program, at any level, that many if not most of the people will not become professional musicians or even go into music performance in college. At the Juilliard pre college program, for example, it is probably 50-50, kids who plan on going to music school and kids planning to go to an academic school; among the 50% who go to academic college, more than a few will continue music, some in fact may end up deciding to try music, but even at Juilliard pre college a relative minority of the kids will end up as pro musicians. Heck, of the kids who graduate from Juilliard college, something like 90% within 10 years are doing something other than music.
I was in NYO USA 2015 and currently go to Stanford, and I will agree that it is truly a transformative experience, nothing like it. If you’re still eligible, audition for a once in a lifetime experience. Plus, its free with great tour locations!
There have been some battles about this on here about NYO, whether they accept “only the best” musicians and so forth, and having hear the NYO play (and having heard top level conservatory and pre school programs, not to mention top youth orchestras like New York Youth Symphony), they are playing at a very high level, arguing if they are as ‘good’ as X youth orchestra or whatever comes down to a matter of opinion really:). I also am familiar enough with NYO now that like college admissions they may not necessarily just take "the best musicians at the audition’ but also strive to have kids from all across the country and kids who could be from different backgrounds than ‘traditional’ music students (on the other hand, that doesn’t mean they are ‘not up to being’ in the orchestra, either, I suggest you look on you tube at kids who have been part of the Sphinx program, for example).
Again, having heard them play, and seeing what the program offers, I don’t think you should worry about the program being ‘diluted’ or whatnot because they strive for diversity, in the end they might seek out kids who otherwise might not apply, want it to be representative of kids from across the country (instead of kids where they have access to so many musical resources, where you might end up with kids from mostly urban areas with great music programs and a lot of resources), but they also want a high level program, so if you want to do it, apply, audition and see if you get in and if you do, enjoy it! No orchestra, no music program, is perfect, and quite honestly the measure of a program is how well they play and how much the kids get out of it, and from what I have heard, the kids who did it really, really enjoy it and get a lot out of it, and just giving my opinion, if they are getting kids who otherwise might not do a program like this, if they do seek kids from all over, it likely may be a very different and rewarding experience then a program made up of kids who are only ‘the very best’ (and at least in the strings world, there is a negative to having only the ‘tippy top’, some of them do a program like this, not because of really wanting to do it, but because they or their parents see it as a great hashmark on their resume, and while they are top level players, don’t really give it much of an effort).
I agree that NYO-USA does not necessarily accept the best musicians (by some reasons), unlike top youth symphonies and top summer youth programs, such as Tanglewood BUTI, Aspen, etc…
My daughter was a member of NYO-USA last summer. There is a second program, NYO2, that was started last year that has the specific mission of serving young musicians who may not have access to resources and/or are members of groups under-represented in the orchestral world. It is a wonderful program as well, but with a distinctly different mission (and a very important mission) from NYO-USA. NYO-USA members are seen more as musical ambassadors to the world, and as such I do believe they try to have representation from all over the country (but not necessarily the same diversity goals as NYO2), however they do require an extremely high level of musical ability in order to pass auditions. My daughter was amazed by the extremely high level of playing from all of the musicians at NYO. She is used to being around very gifted young musicians. We live in an urban area with many music resources, she is a in the city’s top youth orchestra, as well as in a very competitive pre-conservatory program. I say this not to brag at all, as we are very fortunate to have these resources nearby, but to point out that she is well aware of the playing level of the musicians around her and found the NYO musicians to be among the top in the country. In their first rehearsal, they played straight through Bruckner 6, and she said she had never heard an orchestra sound so good during the first run through of a major symphony. She has a disproportionately large number of friends from NYO who are now studying at Juilliard, Curtis, and Colburn. The audition date for this year has passed, but I strongly encourage anyone who might be interested/eligible to apply in future years. It was a fabulous program and my daughter had incredible experiences. In addition to working with Christoph Eschenbach, Emanuel Ax, Valery Gergiev, and Denis Matsuev, she participated in master classes with top conservatory teachers, played Carnegie Hall, and traveled Europe (all for free!). I do believe that it is getting more competitive with each year, and that there are more and more kids who eventually become music majors in the orchestra each year. Only time will tell if this trend continues, but based on my daughter’s experiences, I suspect it will. I will also second musicprnt’s comments about Sphinx…incredible talent within that organization and a terrific mission. My daughter has also been involved with Sphinx and we have a high level of respect for their dedication to classical musicians from non-traditional backgrounds.
I often read youth orchestras here mostly from the East Coast. California Youth Symphony (www.cys.org) has been in existence for 65 years. And I heard their 25-yr conductor said previously their senior youth orchestra is the best youth orchestra out there, “bar none.” They tour every 2 years internationally and have performed all over the world including in one of Vienna’s famous concert halls.
There are a number of top level youth orchestras out there, Seattle has a top level youth symphony, Chicago has a high level ones, New York Youth Symphony is a top level program as well (not surprisingly, a lot of them tend to be in places that have high level music, the Seattle Symphony is one of the better regarded regional orchestras outside the “big 5”.) It is very hard to say who is the ‘best’, besides the fact that it is subjective, that is like saying who is the best orchestra in the world, it can depend on what they are playing, and which performance you catch them on. As far as the conductor of cys claiming they are the best, bar none, that, well, is not unexpected, I heard someone say that about a local youth orchestra here in NJ comparing themselves to NYYS, saying they were as good or better, and my son having played in both groups, would smile at that comparison (among other things, because NYYS is free, the competition to get into it is fierce, the other program is fairly expensive and tends to get kids whose parents see it as a great EC for getting into college…very different levels).
One way to look at a program like this is that they have a certain bar of excellence and once musicians are above that bar, they look at other issues such as demographics. The point isn’t to have an orchestra filled with the highest level technical players so much as an orchestra that demonstrates excellence and diversity across the US. It’s not a meritocracy-- and, by the way, as you age into top chamber festivals you’ll find the same is often true. Above a certain level, it’s like splitting hairs to determine who is “best.” Once you reach a certain level of technical competence and musicality, being chosen does not necessarily mean that you are “the best.” Remember also that top soloistic performers are not necessarily great ensemble players. The opposite is often true.
@glassharmonica:
Well said, I couldn’t say it better,there are a lot of factors that go into the makeup of ensembles, and past a certain level technical proficiency doesn’t mean as much, and as GH said when it comes to ensembles they are different than being a soloist, and things like the player’s willingness to work with others, follow what a conductor is doing, helping shape the sound versus being told what it is, and so forth. I have heard stories about Fritz Kreisler, the famous violinist/composer, that he liked to sit in with the orchestra at the back of the section, but the musicians weren’t quite as thrilled lol.
