Recommendations Needed for HS Violinist

College Majors Music Major
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<p>About the comment that violinists entering conservatories may be at the performance level that students were in the past at the time of graduating from a conservatory: </p>

<p>I have heard of conservatories that have enrolled violin students, some from other parts of the world, who have already won/placed in major (national level or higher) competitions. Has the bar been raised so high that the job of the faculty who teach violin to conservatory students is noticably different than it was, say 30 - 40 years ago? </p>

<p>It seems that if violin students have to be so much more advanced on entering conservatory, the role of the teacher in such places would be different (more polishing, fine-tuning,) than it may have been years ago. This may seem like a strange question, but I wonder if some “master teachers” would find it more rewarding to teach students that are not yet at a near-professional level? Or maybe it is more rewarding to be around the greatest talent?</p>

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<p>It is true that there are many accomplished and talented musicians in high school prep programs. But many, many of them do not go to music school - they often choose to go to Ivy League colleges and major in finance or medicine or law because it compensates better. Perhaps Julliard and Curtis continue at the same high level begun in the prep departments, but I can say for sure that this is not true of all or even most of the music schools and conservatories, even top ones. They still have room (and often money) for the not-yet-fully-formed, but talented 18-year-old who wants to make a career in music. Not every instrumentalist is cut out to be a soloist or even a concert-master and there are plenty of places in schools for these others. And not every violin slot in a top school is filled by someone playing the Sibelius VC. </p>

<p>In the Washington, DC area, there are numerous competitions for high school violin players. They are dominated by kids who end up not going into music. I suppose they enjoy the limelight, but they are also aggregating points for their college resumes. A lot of the really serious kids find that time spent preparing for competitions takes away from time which could be spent learning new techniques or new repertoire.</p>

<p>Viodad asked about less rigorous programs. I think there is a place for most kids who are serious about music. Some of the schools mentioned may be off the radar screen of kids who go to the Julliard Prep, but they can present very viable options for others.</p>

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<p>Since I am a college prof., I’ve often wondered about the music faculty and what they prefer. You would think they would want to teach the musical kids with a passion regardless of technical level, and bring the technique up to the bar for those at different levels. But with so very many kids out there who have very advanced technique at a young age, the teachers can now take the easier ride and just teach music–it’s probably more enjoyable to talk about the music than about technical issues. (I’m sure this is very controversial and I hope I don’t get machine gunned by any music teachers out there)</p>

<p>In terms of conservatories, based on my recent observations, leaving out Juilliard and Curtis, there are enough really outstanding very advanced players out there to fill up all the top conservatories even with the attrition rate of those who decide to go to Ivy League schools or Europe or LACs. But it has always been my belief that any student who really loves what they are doing will find a way to succeed at doing it. And as Stringfollies points out, there a lot of different options.</p>

<p>My earlier post to the OP was just meant as a sorting mechanism for three main categories: 1. most selective conservatories 2. selective conservatories 3. colleges/universities with music departments or music schools attached. There are so many very helpful prior threads in this area going into details about this that I probably don’t need to go further. </p>

<p>But I would say that selectivity again has more to do with the studio than the school. As an example, I’ll mention SUNY Stonybrook, where a violinist we know is studying with Soovin Kim on a special scholarship (she turned down NEC and Oberlin to take the free ride), but there are other studios at Stonybrook that are less selective (I think Kim only takes one or two students per year).</p>

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<p>viodad, again referencing an earlier post of yours here <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/music-major/630008-what-music-schools-would-you-recommend.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/music-major/630008-what-music-schools-would-you-recommend.html&lt;/a&gt; the list BassDad assembled in his post #4 is a fairly comprehensive place to start. Others added to it as well.
If it hasn’t already been mentioned somewhere, I’ll add Duquesne to the list.</p>

<p>Looking back, given my current perception of where you d is from an audition admit perspective, SUNY Purchase may well be a reach. And Stony Brook has a reputation of being a more grad focused program, but there are exceptional faculty drawn from the finest of the NY metro area top tier performing organizations. My guess is it is a fairly competitive admit, given the level of the faculty and the collective rep of the string department in particular. </p>

<p>As part of your recent visits, I’m sure you’ve amassed feedback, particularly if your d took trial lessons with assorted faculty. Sorting through and analyzing both the specific and general comments gleaned from these, try and formulate a consensus, and a plan to go forward. Working from both her current strengths and weaknesses, address the areas that need attention with her current teacher. Her teacher may or may not agree with the assessments, or simply may not be positioned to get your d to the next level. Your d may have hit an impasse, at which point you will need to address seeking alternate instruction. Sophomore, junior and occasionally year of hs seems to be a common time where many bent on a performance path change instructors to “better their chances”.</p>

<p>Do not ignore or fail to consider opinion elicited from area performing professionals as well. If you can arrange an informational lesson and assessment from an active high level performing musician or area high level instructor (these are often one in the same), by all means do so. This goes back to shennie’s advice I referenced earlier.</p>

<p>There may be specific issues with your d’s current skill set that can be overcome, and concentrated effort may improve her chances. If necessary, consider the option of a gap year of intense private study and deffering auditions if the goal is to be competitive at programs like Oberlin, Purchase, IU/Jacobs.</p>

<p>Again, my comments are based on my interpretation of your questions and comments posted, and not meant as criticism or negatives. Please do not take them as such.</p>

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<p>This brings up the general issues of who should attend conservatory and do a BM. The OP’s statement that D is not of conservatory level is telling.
First, while i do think people should follow their passions, one should be realistic. The level of playing entering music school on violin is very high. Nonetheless , many students go this route. I play in a community orchestra with people who majored in violin performance at college who are not good enoughto play in a regional professional orchestra but manage to eek out a living teaching and playing gigs.
My violinist daughter decided many years ago should wouldn’t pursue a career as a violinist, and while talented, didn’t put in the 4-6 hours/day but instead spent the time doing her academic work. She then started singing and is now pursuing a career in voice.Who could predict?
From the tone of the OP , I would have her keep some options open with regard to alternative careers.</p>

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<p>Interesting discussion, one that I was kind of loathe to bring up because I wasn’t sure how applicable it was…</p>

<p>Stringkey, my son didn’t graduate, he just made it in there for this fall (he is just shy of turning 14), and you are correct, the level there has shot up in the past 4 or 5 years. He was one of 10 violin students admitted and to give an idea of the competition, it was less then 1 in 10 who auditioned and was almost half the number of slots for violin that graduated this year. The program has contracted and on top of that the level of auditioning is much, much higher then it was even 4 years ago, there are people in the program now who I have seen, even after several years in the program, that would never pass the audition, they were admitted when it was easier (and I am talking here about the violin program, I have heard it is the same with piano and cello, can’t say about other instruments). </p>

<p>The bar has been raised by a number of factors, but one of the biggest is the influx of kids from Asia, specifically Korea and China. China has a state system that identified musically talented kids early and they have a whole system to build up the talents, and as you can imagine from a state system like that, it is not exactly a walk in the park for the kids. What I was told by someone at Juilliard when we were there the other weekend for placement exams is that kids coming out of those programs feel that the training there on the high school level and beyond is not good for becoming a high level player, and for many of them the goal is a conservatory or pre college program either in Europe or in the US, and Juilliard, having a worldwide brand, attracts a lot of these kids to audition there. Korea is interesting, there for some reason it is usually with daughters, not sons, and in many cases these kids in a different way are ‘bred for battle’ so to speak as the kids in China, these kids are from wealthy backgrounds, are tutored at home, and many of them have lessons 5 or 6 days a week, and when they come to audition they are playing seriously expensive instruments (and if someone wants my source, I got this both from my son’s teacher, who has taught there for a while, and from one of the heads of the school). Not to mention, of course, the children of Asian-American families, where a similar culture reigns…as a result, the level is quite high. I know for certain that in the whole pre college program that foreign students make up around 35% of the total population(And if you want some statistics that we were able to glean from the yearbook, about 75% of the Juilliard Pre college violin program were Asian, and of that 75% 60% or so were Asian girls). </p>

<p>Others were correct when they say a lot of the kids who get into the pre college programs in violin are not necessarily interested in music as a career, numbers I hear are that about 50% of them are using it for resume padding, and as someone else said the competition mania among many of them could very well be about that…but in any event,my son for several years has been in programs with pretty high level Asian kids, and having talked to the parents many of them were dead set against their kids going into music, they saw it simply as a means to get into a good college and then on to a non music career (then again, so were many of the non asian parents, horrified at the difficult prospects of making it as a musician:). </p>

<p>Competitions are not all about getting into a high level college as a hashmark, I suspect a lot of that comes from traditional Asian culture, where exams (or competitions) determine how high someone rises, and it has moved into the music field (and there, judging from what I have read in various magazines and even comments from high level conservatory teachers, is a lot of debate if competitions might be more harmful then helpful, as someone as said, that time is spent practicing for competitions rather then improving technique or learning to express a piece, rather then play it). </p>

<p>I can’t talk for all conservatories or music programs, they all vary in what they are looking for and so forth, but the technical level in the high level programs, which I do know a bit about, is uniformly really high with the violin, the basic concept I have picked up is that now going into the high level conservatories and programs, the degree of technical level is geometrically higher then it was in the past. Will they admit a student who may be less technically advanced then another but has incredible musicality? Could be, but that is all relative, that person so admitted is probably technically at an incredibly high level, especially as compared to the past, but may be just slightly less then others admitted that year. I had the opportunity at one point to read what one of the violin faculty at Curtis wrote, and they said that basically these days in terms of reperatory they expect the student to already be familiar with the major pieces of the rep (Mendelsohn, tchaikovsky, sibelius, brahms), and that in their case they literally assign a piece, and expect the student to be able to come in the next lesson a week later and be able to play it proficiently (which basically means the same thing as already knowing it before you get there) so they can ‘tune it up’</p>

<p>That raises the question that you hear, in the face of this, is all lost if a student isn’t at that kind of level, if they love music, really want to pursue it but are ‘behind’? Really hard question to answer, and I don’t think there is a total answer to that. Even the top level programs at Juilliard and Curtis as some examples, graduate kids, more then a few, who never ‘make it’ in music (and here I am talking about as a professional musician at a high level, orchestra, soloist, chamber), who end up either doing something alternative in music or going the teaching route), so even being there is no guarantee. I have seen a lot of students in violin at both the pre college level and conservatory level whom I would be willing to bet good money on not making it as a high level musician, that though technically almost brilliant failed in almost all other regards, they basically were music playing machines, not musicians. I have also seen some performers from the ‘less competitive schools’ who played absolutely beautifully and could end up with a decent career I would bet. </p>

<p>The real problem here is there is no magic bullet as to who ‘makes it’ in music and who doesn’t, and what that even is is not easily definable. Juilliard pre college and college violin programs are full of kids who believe that they are hot stuff and to whom nothing less then a top level soloist career would suffice, 99.9% of whom are going to find out harsh reality when they get outside the doors (worse, I have heard there are teachers who share that attitude, which is delusional to say the least). Maybe a kid who loves music for its own sake wouldn’t have that atttitude and would strive to be in music because they love it, and that might take them farther then some hotshot who was playing tchaikovsky at 10 who sees themself as some sort of second coming…</p>

<p>I guess all I can offer is that music is a crapshoot at any level, and that if someone truly wants to do music, that they should pursue it to the best of their ability and with their heart, but also keep an eye on the realities.</p>

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<p>Very thoughtful stuff, musicprint. I think that is sort of what I was getting at, though more indirectly.</p>

<p>I am not at all surprised by the level at Curtis. Curtis has always been that way. They look for kids they can train for a “major career” and their students often win international competitions (e.g. just this summer: Ray Chen at the Queen Elisabeth and Josef Spacek at the Michael Hill Competition). Many of the kids who go there begin there in high school. My son studied in high school with a violinist who studied with Gingold at Indiana in the 1980’s (alongside Joshua Bell and Leonidas Kavakos among others). He said that Gingold would routinely give them a concerto to learn, memorized, in a week. I think this is what the highest level has always looked like. </p>

<p>True, there may be more mechanically good players out there, but I suspect it hasn’t changed as much as one might think. Classical music has always been highly competitive especially at the top. Music listeners are only going to respond to players who are both technically amazing and musically inspiring - this is rare. You can get very light-headed in the ethosphere of Julliard and Curtis. The downside of being up there is that the fall can be a nosedive. Only a very few will make it really big.</p>

<p>But, remember, there are lots of teachers out there who are teaching students to be good orchestra members, chamber musicians, teachers, etc. Their expectations are more likely to match the real abilities of the average “good” violin student.</p>

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<p>Somehow we have hijacked the OP’s original topic and are on THE topic which I think absorbs us all as music parents–what are the realistic career options in music? what does it take to succeed?</p>

<p>Musicprnt–your son will have an amazing experience at Juilliard pre-college. The program is amazing and we discovered none of the supposed competitiveness there, nothing but supportive encouragement from faculty and other students. Most of the students there are really passionate about music and we did not meet any who were there for the resume. The uneven quality of performance (which I have indeed noticed and in all departments) I think partly has to do with kids who looked very exciting as prodigies and were accepted very young and who subsequently either coasted or burned out or their early promise just didn’t bear fruit, or the musical talent just doesn’t look as exciting on a 17 year old as it did on a 7 year old. </p>

<p>I would really like to adjust some misperceptions. Watching this year’s crop of seniors, not just in the ethosphere of Juilliard pre-college, but in our local music programs and also from Settlement Music School in Philadelphia and the Philadelphia Youth Orchestra, I think I’ve seen the whole spectrum of players and tracked acceptances among my son’s friends to a wide array of music schools and college (just to name some of the music programs: Temple, Westminster Choir College, West Chester, Indiana, Northwestern, Rice, Oberlin, St. Olaf, Bard, BU, Peabody, Cincinnati, Cleveland, NEC and Juilliard). I honestly don’t know any kids who were just doing music to pad their resumes. It’s possible their parents had that intention, but most of the kids who have stuck with it have turned out to love music and I know an Asian family whose son shocked and surprised them by deciding to go into music at the last minute. In the case of the kids I know who made the decision to go to the Ivy Leagues or other schools like Northwestern or Vanderbilt, I think it has to do more with the type of education they want to get rather than a rejection of music. Most of the kids we keep doing music, double major, or are in double degree programs; many of them also applied to conservatories and had a very hard time making up their minds between the two. </p>

<p>I totally agree with Stringfollies that there are teachers out there who prefer to teach students who are musical and passionate and who know how to nurture talent while the technique is maturing. They are rare and hard to find! If you think about the level of skill that most teachers see now as a matter of routine, you can imagine that many would just not want to be bothered since they can pick and choose from a lot of very proficient very polished players. (A comparable analogy might be the fact that Ivy League Admissions offices could easily fill their freshmen classes with students who had 800s on their SAT scores.) </p>

<p>I agree with everyone about audiences desiring musicians who have music in addition to technical proficiency, but over the years I’ve seen the prizes go to the fast accurate fingers time and again. I think the major orchestra seats–whether for good or ill–are going to be all given out to the top players, many of whom may have expected a solo career and will have to settle for orchestra or chamber jobs. Only 1 in 400 Juilliard graduates goes on to a soloist career (according to a statistic I read somewhere), so the other 399 will be taking up those orchestra seats. </p>

<p>But music exists in all strata in communities, and music making and music teaching goes on everywhere and there are many ways of earning a living at it; someone who is passionate and determined and committed will find their way. I have so many friends doing music on the community level who have string quartets, violin studios, regional or community orchestra seats, community college teaching jobs; they are super fulfilled because they are going around all the time making music. Some graduated from conservatories like NEC, Indiana, Oberlin, Mannes, others were music majors at colleges or Universities. They find their way. For my money, a musician is someone who has simply made the decision to be a musician.</p>

<p>So back to the OP. The fact that his daughter may not be conservatory level doesn’t mean she can’t major in music in college. As violadad points out, she might be close to conservatory level and a gap year and intensive work could take her there.</p>

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<p>Stringfollies-
I agree that music has always been competitive, to get to the highest levels has always been a tough grind, at any given time (in the violin world) there were relatively few ‘superstars’ out there, the Heifetz’s, Millsteins et al… and even for positions as concertmasters and principal players it was difficult.</p>

<p>I think the difference between then and today isn’t so much with the soloists (though that has gotten harder I suspect, read on). If you went back to when Classical music was a ‘bigger thing’, there were a lot more orchestras out there and more importantly larger audiences, back then people like Heifetz were known to more of the general population then Leonidas Kavakos or Hillary Hahn is known outside classical music circles, and performances at places like Carnegie Hall could sell out the way a pop group might today…so there was a much broader base, something that people writing about the history of classical music seem to confirm.</p>

<p>Given that shrinkage, it makes it much tougher today to put together a career in music and given the limited opportunities and that more people are competing for less jobs, the level across the board is higher.</p>

<p>But yes, people at all levels can put together a career as a musician, it just takes a lot more effort then it may have in the past and a lot more creativity. I was reading an article in a new music magazine the other day profiling Anne Akiko Meyers, and she talked about how the business has changed, that even for high level soloists so much of the work that used to be taken care of in defining a career was handled by managers and such, in shaping it, building it, etc, that today soloists have to do a lot of that themselves. It does free them up a bit, to define their own “edge” or path, but it is also challenging and time consuming.With players at ‘lower levels’ it often means being part of several different orchestras, teaching, free lancing, etc, finding ways to promote yourself and so forth, that may have been easier in times past.</p>

<p>In some ways that actually is good for someone who has to work harder, because they already know that they have a challenge in front of them and realize they have to hustle, versus the type I have seen at top level programs who seem to assume that they will be a superstar automatically coming out of one of the high level programs. Anthony Thomassini, the head music critic of the NY Times, was doing one of their “ask the writer” series and he was it for that week. A young musician wrote in talking about the ‘hard times in music’ right now and how to deal with it, and he said something I thought was fitting, he said “it always seems like it is a tough time to be in music”, and he is probably right, it has never been easy. </p>

<p>I think the big difference is that expectations today may be higher then they once were relatively given the shrinkage in the size of the ‘market’ for classical music and the pushing down of technical levels to younger and younger people on average (obviously there were always prodigies and young talent at incredibly high levels; however, like in other endeavors, I believe the average level has gotten much higher).</p>

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<p>Stringkeymom-</p>

<p>I cannot talk about the Juilliard Pre C program the way you have, since my son is just entering, and we have already experienced some surprises (and non surprises), my son already found some like minded kids there, and I also was able to spend some time talking to some of the people in the program. I agree with you that the uneven performances probably are due to kids being admitted who fizzled out, and the Juilliard Pre C (for better or worse) does not ask kids to leave as far as I know, unless they totally are causing problems or some other offense. I got the impression that part of the reason for the contraction was to try and avoid these mistakes, that in looking for higher levels and also by not admitting so many young kids they wouldn’t have what I called the dead spots, kids who looked like they would rather be doing anything then be up on that stage. Though I did see on the day my son had to go in for his exams some that fit the bill of what his teacher calls the ‘pretty little girl prodigies in pretty little dresses with bows in their hair’, so it isn’t entirely gone. </p>

<p>My take on the kids being there to pad college resumes is obviously not ‘total fact’, part of it is based on other programs my son has been in, one of his prior youth symphony programs for example, and also from what has been published on the pre college and also from what some teachers in the program have said to us about the students; if there are a lot of kids there who are seriously passionate about music,rather then being pushed by parents into doing it, my son will be a clam in the mud, for certain:)</p>

<p>You are correct about the competitions, most of them are being won by the fireworks style of players, though what is interesting is that many of the winners of those competitions don’t go on to be all that successful in music and I suspect it is because they lack the musicality and stage presence to make it at a high level (Ray Chen, who just took the Menuhin and QE prizes is an exception IMO, he has it all, and also has the right attitude). Most orchestras from what I hear look beyond the technical fireworks even, especially in their higher seats, if you look at the CM’s for example in the high level orchestras and many of the high level players, they are as musical as they are technically talented, the fast finger robots don’t get those positions (they might get a lesser seat, though). If orchestras take the fast fingered robots I think they are going to find out audiences will drift away, one of the reasons the Philadelphia Orchestra has the loyal fans it does is because they are so musical, as one example of many.</p>

<p>In any event, I agree totally that someone who truly wishes to do music will probably find a way to do it, and that there are no ironclad rules. Personally, I would take someone who loves the music and is less technically adept then many of the virtuoso robots I see out there who don’t seem to realize music is more then the notes, but since I don’t teach music, doesn’t particularly matter.</p>

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<p>Musicprnt,</p>

<p>Forgive me if I am posting info that you aware of, but I am confused by your thought here:</p>

<p>“Most orchestras from what I hear look beyond the technical fireworks even, especially in their higher seats, if you look at the CM’s for example in the high level orchestras and many of the high level players, they are as musical as they are technically talented, the fast finger robots don’t get those positions (they might get a lesser seat, though)”</p>

<p>Professional orchestras (and many college/conservatory and festival orchestras as well) do not operate on the seating principal typically used in high school, i.e. that the “best” player is the concertmaster or 1st chair and the other section players are seated in best to worst order. Likewise, a professional player in a second violin player is not by definition a lesser player than those in the 1st section. </p>

<p>Many professional string sections rotate seating every two weeks or so. Typically, audition announcements (job openings!) will indicate a position for a “section player” or “concertmaster” or “assistant concertmaster”, etc. Sometimes, there is a permanent “seat” involved, but the seat indication has nothing to do with the level of player the organization is looking for.</p>

<p>P.S. If someone could tell me how to make the neat little boxes that quotes appear in - I’d be grateful!</p>

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<p>to get the grey box…first put a left bracket [ …then type the word quote…then put a right bracket ]…then put the message you want in the grey box in next…cut and paste or type…then at the end of the message…put another left bracket […than a back slash /…then the right bracket ] and poof whatever you put between will be in the grey box.</p>

<p>Did that make sense???</p>

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<p>You can practice with the quote thing but trying it and hitting “preview post” to make sure you did it right. </p>

<p>[ quote]put your quote here[/ quote]</p>

<p>Take out the space between the bracket and “quote” and between the slash and “quote” and that should do it.</p>

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<p>Fiddlestix-
It depends on the orchestra and I was using the CM as an example (as far as I know, the Philadelphia, New York Philharmonic, the Boston and the Berlin Philharmonic don’t rotate their CM’s or principal positions, though when the principal player is not there the associate CM will take over. My son’s earlier violin teacher was a principal in the NJSO, and as far as I know since getting the position that hasn’t changed and so forth. Stanley Drucker has been principal clarinetist for many years and so forth.) And I realize that with professional orchestras that the chair may not reflect how good or bad they are relatively,since orchestra positions in most orchestras stay fixed for a lot of years. (For example, a really dynamic violinist might get into an orchestra in the first violins somewhere near the back because that is all that is open, since orchestra positions are filled as people leave), and might even be ‘better’ then the CM. Some orchestras rotate back seat positions where they may not do so for the principals. Some orchestras do that I am aware, the Seattle went to multiple CM’s for example, and Orpheus revolves positions I believe. </p>

<p>My main point/idea/thought is that orchestras don’t necessarily pick simply because of technical fireworks, they carefully pick people who fit the dynamics of the group from everything I have been read and told. The Philadelphia, for example, has been know for a very specific sound and for being a very “musical” orchestra while the Berlin Philharmonic has different things they look for (or similar things,too), it is what makes orchestras different. And especially when looking at principal positions, where many don’t rotate, they are looking for people who are technically at the top but also have the personality and musicality that fits, that is all. One of the things I have heard from professional musicians, for example, is that a lot of the hotshots who win the competitions and such are at a disadvantage, because many of them have never learned the dynamics it takes to make it as an orchestral or chamber musician. Not long ago the Curtis Symphony played Carnegie Hall, and the NY Times reviewers comments was that they played like a bunch of soloists going off in their own directiong, rather then playing as an orchestra for the most part.</p>

<p>Obviously, there are so many professional groups out there I can only talk about the ones I have seen or read about. Again the key point to me is that being a musician is a lot more then simply mastering the techniques and such, that there is a lot more then that, and that what may work to master competitions may actually work against getting out there into the music works.</p>

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<p>

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<p>Wow! Thanks, Binx and Cartera - I think the box thing worked! Such fun, I feel like a pro!</p>

<p>Right musicprnt, I didn’t intend to suggest that any positions other than section players rotated - or that wind players rotate. Obviously some positions are more permanent.</p>

<p>Thanks for clarifying your speculation. It’s not unusual for students and adults unfamiliar with professional music groups to think that musicians are “seated” best to worst and I thought that was what you were implying.</p>

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<p>Fiddlestix-
A lot of people believe that, because of the way seating usually works in school groups and such,but once I came into contact with some orchestra musicians I found out it works very differently in pro orchestras, that seats open up when they do and that you can find a world class musician in the back of the seconds because that is where a position opened up (or rather in the seconds, period, if they rotate), and given how long people tend to stay in orchestras, this is not surprising. Even in some youth symphonies and the like they will put some strong players towards the back of sections, even where seating is generally “higher seat=better player” to balance out the sound.</p>

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<p>fiddlestix - I think you meant Thumper, not me.</p>

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<p>It’s ok Binx…I know YOU know how to do the grey box quote thing too!</p>

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<p>It’s just so easy to mix up those brassy moms.</p>

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<p>binx, a simple word change centered around the instruments involved would of course drag this thread to a different level. </p>

<p>A bit too “out of the box” for even the Meta-thread, so I will of course refrain. </p>

<p>Just wanted to let you know I recognize the potential. As I said, letting a pun slide by grates to the bone. :D</p>