Labanchi Etude

In this etude, please present your best technique, articulation, phrasing, and musical ideas. In many auditions, the committee forms its general impression about a candidate in the first 1-2 minutes of the audition. Often, the committee's evaluation is 90% complete after a short time. This etude is likely the first thing that the committee will hear you play, so do your best to make a professional impression. Choose a tempo that you can handle, plan your breathing, and cultivate a secure technique where needed and expressiveness where needed.

Dvorak Symphony 7

Brahms and Dvorák were contemporaries. The sixth symphony bears many resemblances to Brahms' second symphony, and the seventh symphony was directly inspired by a performance of Brahms' Third Symphony that Dvorák heard. So, the general sensibility is Romantic, melodies are expansive, as rich in color as possible, and where long phrasing arcs are most important.


FIRST MOVEMENT: Like the first movement of Brahms' Symphony no. 3 (if you don't know this piece, please listen to it, for it is one of the jewels of the orchestral repertoire for clarinet), the compound meter and long phrases suggest smoothness. The challenge here is to play in perfect rhythm AND be very musical. In the opening phrases, the traditional phrasing of "play louder when the melody goes higher, softer as it goes lower" works very well. Sixteenth notes should sound flowing but never fast or panicked. Overall tempo is around 69 for the dotted quarter.


SECOND MOVEMENT: When I played this piece, the tempo for the slow movement excerpt was in the 60–66 range for the quarter. The second line (the last five beats of the solo) should be played strictly in rhythm, because the orchestration is thicker, but in the first line, the scoring is lighter, and the player should play expressively. Two measures of steadily building energy, followed by expressive "sighing" figures in the third measure. In the fourth measure, choose an appropriate peak for the crescendo (probably the BEGINNING of beat three or four) and practice it consistently that way, and would caution against accenting beat 2 in that measure.

Schubert Octet

Overall challenges here: planning your dynamics, breathing, and musical ideas. Being interesting because your SOUND is interesting, both because it is a pleasant, consistent sound, and because you control the tone color changes to serve the phrasing.

PLANNING YOUR BREATHING: devise a plan for your breathing, mark it, and stick to it.

NOTE-BY-NOTE SHAPING: this passage needs not only good large scale phrasing, but timbral changes within each long note. For example, the opening C and E, both needs a sense of overall phrasing toward the F, but each note should also start gently and open, or "bloom."

RECORDINGS: listen to a couple different recordings of this, and I am sure you will get ideas for tempo, breathing spots, phrase peaks, etc.

GRACE NOTES: as you will hear in most recordings (please tell me if I am wrong), the grace notes are usually played on the beat.

Shostakovich Symphony no. 9

Shostakovich's Ninth Symphony is often described as borrowing the Classical style and sensibility of Mozart, but still retaining Shostakovich's individualistic traits. One critic remarked "The Russian composer should not have expressed his feelings about the defeat of Nazism in such a childish manner." That quote is helpful for achieving the flippant style of the third movement excerpt, but let's talk about the second movement first.

SECOND MOVEMENT: Tempo is in the 100-112 range, for the quarter note. Should be able to feel the 3/4 measures "in one," even though pretty slow.

Phrasing: maybe each of the first three phrases have a ritard at the phrase ends, on the "wrong notes" like the A-flat-E-flat in the first phrase. Maybe there is no ritard. However you play it, it should sound like those first three phrases are "aborted" or otherwise "fail" to achieve momentum. Then when you play the long phrase, then it really sounds like you have achieved something. I suggest breathing in between beats one and two in m. 16, to avoid needing to breathe again until the quarter rest in m. 24. This fourth phrase is the longest and builds the most, and the fifth phrase gradually releases all the energy built up in the fourth.

high F-sharp - my favorite fingering here is T/R o 2 o (so basically regular high F-sharp) but the right hand reaches up and gently vents the third side key (the second from the top side key)

the ending: those last two notes are easy to play out of tune, I suggest checking the whole excerpt, and especially those two notes, with your tuner. Also keep in mind that the second clarinet enters in m. 31 to continue the phrase, and so a ritard in m. 30 and 31 is not appropriate.

THIRD MOVEMENT: making the clarinet sound like a flute

If you listen to a recording of the opening of this movement, you can hear that the clarinets are assisting the flute section. At the moment, I am away from Greensboro, no access to the score, but what I remember is two clarinets supporting two flutes and piccolo, maybe not for the whole excerpt, but at least the later, more fully scored phrases. Light articulation and dynamic peaks heading up to some high notes are the ways you can achieve that flute-like quality, and also the light, ebullient style that sounds like a combination of Mozart and Shostakovich. 

Articulation is hard for me on this excerpt, especially because it is for A clarinet. So I start with this by practicing repeated notes instead of the arpeggios. I work on F-F-F, G-G-G and get that before playing the printed parts, and you could also work out simplified version of the other broken eighth note measures. Don't let the scales rush here, my strongest piece of advice for this excerpt is NEVER practice it faster than you can play perfectly, and be patient with your tempo increase from day to day. Dotted quarter= 112, plus or minus is the tempo I work toward in this. Especially be sure that the first two sixteenth notes of each group do not rush.