<p>Hi - though probably not going to be a music major, my DD is a serious orchestra girl (youth orchestra, pre college). We visited U Chicago and liked it, but didn't get the chance to explore that. Does anyone know the level of their orchestra. We have ruled out several schools of similar academic level +/- a bit because of lack of good orchestra program. Any info would be greatly appreciated!</p>
<p>It depends what you mean by “good”. There is a lot of musical talent at the University of Chicago, and a lot ofn interest in classical music and serious orchestral music. Chicago the city is an huge draw for anyone with a serious interest in music, of any type. University-sponsored organizations are not the only outlets for studnets to play and to perform music. But the University of Chicago orchestra, as far as I could tell (I only heard it a few times, and the last was three years ago), was nowhere near the level of student orchestras at equivalent academic colleges (say, HY) whose orchestras are staffed by amateurs, not performance majors. More like the Stanford orchestra of 30 years ago (I have no idea what Stanford’s orchestra is like today). </p>
<p>Nor does it occupy as much time in the lives of its members. For better or worse, at Chicago the balance of focus between academics and extracurriculars is weighted more heavily towards academics than at the Ivies, and as a direct result the quality of the extracurriculars tends to be lower pretty much across the board. That said, I think the people in the orchestra enjoy it and take it seriously; it’s just not the #1 thing in their lives.</p>
<p>That said, I caution again: (1) I haven’t heard the Chicago orchestra in several years, and several years is a long time given how fast the admissions changes have come at Chicago, (2) it has been even longer since I heard any other university orchestra (Penn, maybe five years ago), and (3) I have never heard the orchestras for lots of colleges you might consider “of similar academic level +/- a bit,” so I don’t know quite what I am adding to the information you have. (Unless, that is, one of the schools you have written off for not having a good enough orchestra is Yale, in which case I can pretty much guarantee you won’t like Chicago, either.)</p>
<p>You may want to look at some colleges with conservatories that let good non-conservatory students into their orchestras. Say, Oberlin, Hopkins, Rochester</p>
<p>I think this is the most important takeaway from JHS very good post:</p>
<p>“For better or worse, at Chicago the balance of focus between academics and extracurriculars is weighted more heavily towards academics than at the Ivies, and as a direct result the quality of the extracurriculars tends to be lower pretty much across the board. That said, I think the people in the orchestra enjoy it and take it seriously; it’s just not the #1 thing in their lives.”</p>
<p>If you’re ruling out several comparable schools because of lesser-than-desired orchestral programs, I’m not sure if UChicago would fit the bill. It seems as if you want a “great school AND…” environment (in this case, great school AND very good student orchestra). The schools with non-conservatory students in orchestras that JHS mentioned (UR, Hopkins, etc,), or perhaps some of the Ivies if the orchestra is good enough could be better choices.</p>
<p>Generally, UChicago is a much better choice for someone who is very into the academics, and is happy to explore another extra-curricular interest, albeit not at a super-intense level. If your child wants great academics AND (whatever that and… may be - a great marching band, a great orchestra, high level athletics, great a capella, etc.), UChicago still isn’t quite there. Maybe it will at some point down the line, but right now, it’s not. It simply doesn’t value extra-curriculars the way many of its peers do. </p>
<p>I just checked the Chicago and Yale web pages to confirm (or not) my memory. Both orchestras operate by audition, with all players required to audition each year. Both have professional directors. Yale’s orchestra is limited to undergraduates; Chicago draws members from a fairly broad definition of the entire university community. Both perform six on-campus concerts per year; both use guest conductors and guest artists sometimes; both aim to present a challenging repertoire, including a healthy amount of 20th Century (and later) works. (Note also that both universities also have myriad other performance groups.)</p>
<p>The Chicago orchestra rehearses once a week (for 2-1/2 hours); Yale twice a week, with two extra rehearsals the week of any performance. (I’ll bet there are extra pre-performance rehearsals at Chicago, too.) Yale regularly gives concerts off campus, tours every few years, and records (recently, the complete Hindemith piano concertos), and its website has a fairly impressive list of professional musicians who are YSO alumni. (Realistically, though, at any particular time there are probably 0-2 future professionals in the YSO.)</p>
<p>Here are some links and summaries of rehearsal schedules for a few other university orchestras:</p>
<p>Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra: <a href=“http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~hro/faq”>http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~hro/faq</a>
(HRO rehearses twice a week, with each rehearsal taking 2.5 hours. Closer to concerts, there’s probably more rehearsal time. The Orchestra has also gone on tour all over the world.)</p>
<p>Stanford Symphony Orchestra: <a href=“http://www.stanford.edu/group/sso/cgi-bin/wordpress/about/ensembles/”>http://www.stanford.edu/group/sso/cgi-bin/wordpress/about/ensembles/</a>
(SSO rehearses twice a week - ostensibly for around 2 hours each time. The Orchestra also has toured all over the place.)</p>
<p>Duke Symphony Orchestra: <a href=“Symphony Orchestra | Department of Music”>Symphony Orchestra | Department of Music;
(DSO rehearses twice a week, each rehearsal takes 2 hours. DSO also tours, I believe, but I’m not sure about this.)</p>
<p>UPenn Symphony Orchestra: <a href=“Penn Symphony Orchestra | Department of Music”>http://www.sas.upenn.edu/music/ensembles/penn-symphony-orchestra</a>
(The Orchestra rehearses twice a week, two hours each time. This Orchestra also tours all over the world.)</p>
<p>In comparison to these peers, unsurprisingly, UChicago appears to be on the lower end in terms of time commitment and, consequently, intensity. UChicago’s orchestra rehearses once a week for 2-2.5 hrs. Moreover, it doesn’t appear that UChicago’s orchestra tours, in contrast to many other university orchestras. I imagine UChicago has a lighter rehearsal schedule because, as many other extra-curriculars on campus experience, academics come first, and midterms and finals are never far away… </p>
<p>Thanks JHS and Cue7 especially re U chicago!</p>
<p>Well, I hope she can get into Yale or Harvard! Hopkins is out. Great school academically, but she listened to their orchestra rehearse and wasn’t taken with them - compared to her youth orchestra. Also, she didn’t like that there were a lot of people my age. (i am not insulted 
All the serious music students play in the Peabody Orchestra, but she strongly preferred the Northwestern model of the music school w/in the university - rather than two separate, but affiliated schools. FYI for anyone else out there who might be reading, if you do the Hopkins/Peabody program, you are required to live at Peabody as a freshman.</p>
<p>I guess she would have more schools to choose from if she would consider West or South, but that’s a no go for her. (Too bad for me; I would love to visit CA often!) So I guess the 5-6 that she has on the list are the ones, but we hadn’t considered Penn. I will encourage her to look into that one. We still have to check out Columbia too. At least there, you can also have option of playing in the New York Youth Symphony which goes through college age. </p>
<p>ctmusicmom,</p>
<p>If your daughter should consider UPenn, note that the school has a reciprocal agreement with the world-renown Curtis Institute of Music. You can read a bit about the program here: <a href=“https://www.sas.upenn.edu/lps/reciprocal/fall_spring”>https://www.sas.upenn.edu/lps/reciprocal/fall_spring</a> (I think that describes Curtis students taking classes at Penn, but I believe it works the other way sometimes too).</p>
<p>The other side of the coin on this, of course, is the importance of the broader education offered at the university/college your daughter selects. I get the sense that Penn has more robust options in terms of extra-curriculars and music, but the education offered (especially the first couple of years of college) is quite different than UChicago’s approach. UChicago (like Columbia, which your daughter is considering) has a core with fairly stringent reading/writing/research requirements, and Penn does not - it offers more “English 101” type classes, whereas UChicago has more “Human Being and Citizen” with lots of close readings of famous scholars. </p>
<p>I imagine that the higher-level courses and offerings are quite similar at UChicago and UPenn, but the first couple of years feel a bit different. (Personally, I think the liberal arts education offered at UChicago is second to none, but the extra-curriculars are still a work in progress.)</p>
<p>The Chicago orchestra is a whole-community orchestra, too, like Hopkins’. </p>
<p>I thought the Peabody Orchestra had a few top-flight Hopkins students in it. One of my kids’ close friends was in that market – a strong student, a credible, but not sensational candidate for top conservatories, but with a portfolio of unique skills that made him very welcome in music circles. Conservatory faculties were not so willing to give him an ultra-competitive slot for what was then his principal instrument, but many were anxious to have him around in the community, and promised him an orchestra seat and other performance opportunities if he chose the associated college. </p>
<p>He wound up as a music major at Penn, and he’s now applying to graduate programs in conducting. He was ambivalent about his experience with the Penn Orchestra, although his parents (both serious musicians, one professional) thought it was great in performance. A few years ago, there was a poster here, trojanwarhorse (? not sure about that), who had transferred from USC to Penn. He was NOT ambivalent about the Penn Orchestra – he hated it. Both the kid I know and the CC poster had good things to say about other music (including classes) at Penn, though.</p>
<p>Re the Curtis program: I think that is really only a one-way street. In theory, Penn students can take classes at Curtis, but the program only applies to courses where no equivalent is offered by the home institution. Well, guess what? Penn has thousands of classes Curtis doesn’t offer, and Curtis has at most a handful that Penn doesn’t offer, and those are of very limited interest to Penn students. The performance instruction at Curtis is in a different universe from Penn, of course, but the simple fact is that if the Curtis faculty wanted to teach you, and you were willing to put in the time to be taught by them, you would be at Curtis, not Penn. That’s not to say the program doesn’t benefit Penn students – it’s ultra cool to have some Curtis students around, and there are opportunities for informal contacts. But Penn students aren’t getting piano lessons from Gary Graffman.</p>
<p>The UChicago symphony has some recent recordings on YouTube - just look up “university of chicago symphony” and look at the more recently uploaded recordings (Rienzi, Firebird, Danse Macabre, etc.) and make a decision for yourself.</p>
<p>I was a youth orchestra person in high school (and almost went to music school, but for composition) and am now in the UChicago symphony. Compared to the youth symphony I was in senior year of high school, it’s honestly pretty unrewarding and not that great. It’s not emphatically bad, but I wouldn’t consider it a particularly good orchestra. The other former high school youth orchestra people I know feel pretty similarly. On the other hand, though the first 3 concerts weren’t great, the work we’re doing at the moment with Prokofiev 5 is actually sounding pretty good and is really enjoyable to play in. But that might be more of an exception than the rule. Though there are also non-orchestra ensembles that are quite good. (There are a few surprisingly good choirs, a jazz group that plays in the neighborhood a lot, and a student-run brass band that I’ve heard good things about.)</p>
<p>That said, ruling out schools based entirely on their orchestras seems like a rash decision to me. Chicago and Harvard, for example, are incredibly different environments (or so I hear), and choosing between those just based on an orchestra seems unwise.</p>
<p>Thanks harpsichorddude so much for the input on UChicago Symphony. I hear what you’re saying about not choosing based solely on orchestra. She is definitely planning on applying to UChicago because she did really like what she heard about academics, the kind of kids that go there, and the quirky essay topics which are right up her alley, the city of Chicago. Our tour guide was awesome and made a fantastic impression. We have been told that unusual essay topics makes UChicago somewhat self-selecting in terms of students - that the ordinary smart (vs quirky smart, or truly intellectual) won’t often apply. In fact, I could even see her applying BECAUSE of those essay topics. She’s definitely looking for a place where the kids are not only smart, but really intellectual - probably applies to many schools, or certain groups of kids within schools. </p>
<p>Do you know offhand if there are other orchestral opportunities outside of UChicago. I guess she can look and see if the Chicago Youth Symphony goes up to that age. NY Youth Symphony goes up to age 22, so that’s an option for Columbia and NYU kids.</p>
<p>The Chicago Youth Symphony is (at least according to their webpage a few months ago) high school only. I’m doing enough other stuff here that I never looked into it further. I really don’t know of any other orchestral opportunities offhand. I know of one person who I think does some freelancing, but I don’t know much about him. I also know a few people who are really good musicians but aren’t involved with the department at all and who have made their own opportunities sort of on the side. But those two sentences are both special cases that don’t say much.</p>
<p>Performance this weekend:</p>
<p><a href=“Calendar of Events | The University of Chicago”>http://events.uchicago.edu/cal/event/showEventMore.rdo;jsessionid=FDDF4B193DEC044AB307C29E7393D0C4.bw06</a></p>
<p>Newmassdaughter was in the orchestra her first year. She found the conductor way too flamboyant and a distraction. So she did chamber instead and had a great time. If you want to know the caliber of chamber, PM me and I can send you a you tube link. </p>
<p>Remember that Chicago is not a performance school. It’s emphasis is on music theory. Saying that, they had a great group in residence who gave good master classes. You also have access to good teaching. For instance, my D took lessons with a CSO member and the cost was partially paid with a UofChicago music grant. </p>