Orchestral Excerpts for the flute - A Brief Guide

Orchestral Excerpts – A brief guide

Candidates for orchestral positions, and increasingly, places at music college, are required to prepare and perform a series of orchestral excerpts selected by the panel. These can be taken from an incredibly broad selection of repertoire, but the following seem to appear the most often: the solos from Leonore 3 (Beethoven), A Midsummer Night's Dream (Mendelssohn), Daphnis and Chloe (Ravel), Carmen (Bizet) and Prelude a l'apres-midi d'un faune (Debussy) These will almost always be accompanied by extracts of Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Dukas or Mahler, as they have their own particular technical demands.

A lot of flautists will have played some or all of these extracts before in orchestras, but it is incredibly important to recognise that to play them out of their context, without the support of a conductor or of fellow musicians, is an entirely different discipline and one that requires a different kind of preparation.

This principle applies to many aspects of playing that come more naturally in the orchestral environment, but most particularly to timing and rhythm. In an audition situation you will be the umpteenth flautist to play a particular excerpt and panels will be unforgiving if you fail to adhere precisely to the rhythm on the page. This may sound obvious, but every professional musician I have spoken to who has been on an audition panel has complained of the frustration of hearing the same mistakes made time and time again by otherwise excellent musicians. A classic example for flautists is Leonore 3, which I have chosen to expand on below. Something else to think about is intonation. Without the reference points provided by other players it can go awry very quickly, so it is important to always keep this thought at the forefront of your mind.

If you haven't played an excerpt orchestrally, it is vital to do your homework. Listen to it, look at a score, know exactly what else is happening in the orchestra and show that you know in the way you play.

Beethoven – Leonore Overture no. 3

This is perhaps the most ubiquitous excerpt for flautists, and one with a number of traps to fall into! Here are a few things to avoid:

• Don't expend all your air playing ff on the first note – this is an orchestral tutti so you can come down in dynamic fairly quickly and conserve the air for the diminuendo. Make sure you don't go flat!

• The triplet rhythm at bar 17 should be played at exactly the same tempo as the preceding three bars – it is very easy to start rushing so think the triplet rhythm before you play it.

• In the same place, resist the temptation to breathe in every rest, or you'll disturb the rhythm.

• The start of the scale in 328 may be marked piano, but start strongly as the first few notes won't rise above the strings otherwise.

• Ensure the triplets are precisely rhythmical in 346.

• Hold the final note for the full length. Hardly anyone does this in auditions, so to follow the composer's instructions faithfully will distinguish you from the rest.