What to do about no-hires

There are things I want to add and clarify in response to my posts and as a member of an OCSM orchestra: - I can be wrong on this, but auditions seemed to be a bit like a fluctuating market (supply and demand), the committee's expectation being the price of a product and the position being the product. If no one seems to buy a product (e.g. fruit, tool, you name it) for a long time, the price will tend to lower itself (generally, not saying always) due to the supply and demand effect. The same concept goes for the auditions when they continuously result in no hire. - While the committee members (including myself) could have done better with a few of the auditions (in my orchestra) that resulted in no hire, I don't believe in some conspiracy theories such as "the committee deliberately wanted to hire no one" etc. All the musicians, even the most picky members, in every single committee I served in for various instruments came in at the beginning of the audition wanting to hire someone.

- Something I heard a lot from various professional orchestral musicians:

Personally I partly disagree with the rhetoric/trope that "oh, it's intonation and rhythm if you didn't pass the prelims" or that "you can tell within a short time that about 90% of the candidates have no business being there." This is a bit misleading. In my experience, every audition is different and unpredictable for us. You might have an audition where 50% of the candidates seems to play well enough to pass the prelims, and have another audition where 90% of the players did poorly in the prelims. In general, I think more and more candidates these days understand about playing in tune. Rhythmic subdivision and sound quality are the areas where the candidates can invest more in their preparation.

Aside from pitch and rhythm, there are several factors (that are just as important) that can lead to losing votes in the prelims. To give you specific examples (mainly cello but string-oriented):

- potentially offensive interpretation of early music works (Haydn/Mozart concertos or Bach solo) for some committee members who are not familiar with or dislike historically informed period instrument style (this may not be the issue for every orchestra).

- Either narrow or wide vibratos all the time

- Sound that is forced, harsh or thin

- Not changing sound colours

- wrong choice of tempo (even one excerpt with a too fast or slow tempo can fail your audition, despite your good intonation and rhythm) - playing 16th notes like a tremolo (play the right rhythm unless asked otherwise)

- Don Juan/Heldenleben: sound too weak or harshly loud tone while playing loud passages

- Beethoven 5 slow movement or Brahms 3/4: portatos while playing dotted rhythms

- Beethoven 5 Scherzo: pp way too loud, tempo too fast

- Mendelssohn Scherzo/Italian Symphony: unable to separate bow strokes (sounding as if they can't play spiccato), crashing to get the bow bouncing while playing the Scherzo.

- Brahms 3 3rd movement: wrong style, too heavy while playing mezza voce

- Some professional musicians might get mad at me for saying this but let's face it. In many of the orchestras (or even every ICSOM/OCSM orchestra), there are always going to be more than several musicians (not just a few) who cannot even play 80% of what some of the great candidates can do. Seriously. And they think they can play better than they actually do and might be surprised after listening to recordings of their own playing.

- Having said that, I think this is understandable because musicians that go through conservatories and music schools are taught to be very self-critical and hold very high standards for our playing. We beat ourselves up, but we are not really taught to be empathetic and to see things in big picture. It's easy for any committee member to lose perspective. This applies to me as well.

- We professional orchestral musicians need to self-reflect on ourselves. In an ideal world, all the orchestral musicians should serve as a proctor before they serve in an audition committee. Of course that's not going to happen but you get my point. It was an enlightening experience for me to proctor an audition in the past. You learn to be in the shoes of candidates and understand better that most candidates are trying hard to do their best. It's a challenge that the screen takes away that human connection (though I am personally in favour of the use of screens in all rounds).

- Beyond some good level of intonation, rhythm and not missing too many notes, it is already subjective enough to evaluate what constitutes good playing and also what's considered a good fit for an ensemble. Even within my section, each of my colleagues and myself have different playing styles (though we can still find common grounds and blend well as a group) and different preferences on what kind of a player and musical personality we are looking for. Performing arts is subjective to begin with, unlike mathematics or science.

There are a lot of questions to ask (with some sarcasm) about fairness. I am not saying what's right or wrong.

- Playing concertos that almost don't relate to your section job (please tell me if you are a non-principal section player and ever had the opportunity to play a concerto movement in YOUR orchestra)?

- Can you make a fair comparison among those candidates that play different concertos (one person playing Prokofiev, another playing Barber, others playing Brahms, Sibelius, etc)?

- Why do some orchestras force candidates to play Haydn (cello) or Mozart (violin) concertos when much of the programming consists of Romantic-era or 20th century works? Personally I think it's unnecessary and only shows how well a candidate plays that specific concerto (or that audition piece). But that's just my opinion.

- What about the fact that you or others get to play in the morning or afternoon? Rhetorically speaking, who determines the order of candidates (let's say prelims)? Drawing a number by candidates or at the discretion of personnel managers? There might be a tendency that overseas or experienced players will be assigned to a later group (due to a time zone difference or flight schedule). In your view, should you accommodate them to a better time in order to give everyone the best conditions to play well? OR should all candidates gather in the morning and draw a number? Thank you all for reading. And you don't have to agree with what I said here.

In our orchestra, we want to hire! We are under no pressure from our management to not hire because of cost-saving reasons or continuing to hire subs. In the events we have had no-hires, it's been because of the level of auditions we heard on that day. Im happy to say we've had very few no-hires in the last several years.

That being said, in my experience, the overall quantity and quality of applicants for our orchestra has certainly gone down since Covid. We receive perhaps half of the candidates as we used to, and the winners tend to be pretty clear-cut (as opposed to the past, where we might deliberate over 4 or 5 highly qualified finalists). I'm not sure what the reasons or solutions are. Others might have different experiences.

I am a member of a full-time symphony orchestra and have sat on many committees including ones who have hired and ones who have not. I've also voted for trials and seen that process happen multiple times at this point etc.

I have taken many more auditions than committees I have sat on. The first and most important thing I prioritize when sitting on a committee is to be fair in my judgement (not holding anyone to any standard I wouldn't expect of myself), and also advocate for candidates and for a just and well run audition which follows union rules and procedures. I try to be an advocate as a committee member and I know many of my colleagues do the same because we KNOW how tough it is. We've all been there and many of us recognize the luck and opportunity we have to be in the position we're in. Etc.

With that said, the process is flawed and very complex. Things are never as straight forward as they seem and there are so many road blocks to making things work smoother, faster and more efficient both for committee members and candidates. I will say that myself and many colleagues in my orchestra are ACTIVELY fighting to make our auditions better each time and to give candidates more of an opportunity...and really just to make sure everyone who auditions for our orchestra has a positive experience. For instance, I and my horn colleagues always take thorough notes and offer them to candidates...no matter how far they advance. This practice was not common when I was auditioning and still isn't to this day. It's unfair to candidates...gives them no context to understand why they might've been cut etc

I listen with empathy and understanding behind the screen, but what I want to hear from a musician in my orchestra is a gorgeous sound and GUTS to really go for the music and style. Strauss shouldn't sound like Brahms and Debussy shouldn't sound like Stravinsky. I want contrast and someone who excites and inspires me! On top of all the basics etc.

In my orchestra, people get cut from prelims due to rhythm and intonation first and foremost. There isn't a lot of subjective things about sound or interpretation in this round. As a hornist, I'm more understanding of cracks and messy slurs but my violin And percussion colleagues are not. That's part of what makes a committee work is the diversity of listeners and interpretations.

The semis is where the committee starts to become more subjective with sound concept and interpretation. And rhythm, intonation etc need to be super solid or it's an immediate cut.

Finals here is about being wow'd.. We want a player who really sells, convinces, goes for the music! And then if it's a section or principal job..demonstrates they can do the role that's being auditioned. In my case, we often have section rounds so we can play with the candidate and really get a feeling from that. It's amazing how much you can gather from playing with someone for 5-10 min...

Every committee I've been on has had wildly different opinions. Out of 10 people, we hardly ever have a unanimous support, BUT committee members here will support the position of the section who's position is being auditioned. Common courtesy I think.

In regards to no hires, we all hate them as much as you do. My orchestra has vacancies and it's a huge strain on us as an ensemble. We WANT to hire and we want great players. The issue is that since Covid our numbers for auditions have gone down a lot. For a horn audition, we used to get 40-50 people. We struggle now to get 20-30 sometimes. Some of that it seems is due to the large amount of vacancies and people just can't keep up with the amount of auditions. When I was auditioning there were only 6-7 auditions a year of salaried jobs for horn. Post Covid there can be 6-7 in 3 months.

People are not hired here or advanced due to one reason. Votes. If you want to advance, you need majority vote. It's as simple as that. If you want to be hired, the committee has to firstly agree they're ready to do a hire vote and then one person or more has to receive the votes for a hire or runner up etc.

Trials are only awarded to candidates of our orchestra once we feel they are 95% there. When the committee is a bit on the fence but overall is excited about someone. It's sortve a path to hire. We do not award trials unless the committee feels someone is playing well enough to be offered one.

I am currently under a lot of stress due to vacancies in my orchestra and my section. I want those positions filled, but I will not vote for someone to be offered a trial (which is essentially a strong path to hiring) whom I do not feel good about their playing. I could be sitting next to you the rest of my career. It's that serious to me. This person will be playing into my head...literally.

Sitting on a committee has been stressful, hard and difficult in more ways than I ever thought it would be. I don't enjoy critiquing others playing. I want people to do well and I consider myself an advocate for candidates at auditions. I am a young member of our orchestra and always try to encourage my older colleagues who have not taken auditions recently to listen with empathy and not from a high horse.

In the end, I cannot control the level of playing that's represented that day at an audition, I cannot force my committee members to bend to my well and nor can they do the same to me.

It's a flawed process but in my orchestra we, the players, are working to make it better and hope our candidates can have a positive experience even if it doesn't workout for them in the end. Wishing you all the best!

Sharing an excerpt from an AFM article entitled "Advancing Inclusion", full link here: https://www.local802afm.org/allegro/articles/advancing-inclusion/

While I, too, understand the reasons that lead to no hires, I feel like it's an outcome that should be avoided and that more efforts can be taken to prioritize hiring.

So many orchestras are going to "trials" after somebody has won an audition. Isn't there generally a two year demonstration period given prior to being awarded tenure that is essentially a trial?

My frustrations lie in the screening process, and the general no-hire problems. I have put orchestras on my personal list of places not to audition when being asked to provide recordings more than 3 times in a row. At that point, it doesn't seem worth it to me, but I'm also in a place in my life where I'm comfortable picking and choosing where I audition (and I find no problem with that now; I used to be the kind to throw myself at everything, but my mental health is worth more than prepping every audition under the sun. That's just ME though).

As for no-hires...is it really that difficult to award the finalists a trial? I'm asking from an admin point of view as well, if it's just too expensive to provide trials for 3 people or so. We know the audition process is nothing like sitting in the chair itself, you may as well give people the opportunity of a trial before declaring a no hire. Give them the opportunity to prove if they can play in the chair/mesh well with the orchestra. If no one steps up to the plate, cool, at least you've done the "research" you know?

Just my two cents.

One thing to keep in mind is that there are many reasons for an audition committee to come to a no-hire result. Sometimes qualified candidates are denied simply because there were differences of opinion between committee members or between the committee and the MD, and a deadlock results. This is of course something beyond the candidates’s control, and frankly beyond the control of individual committee members as well. It’s an imperfect system because human beings are running the process. But I don’t think orchestras should have a mechanism (self-imposed or otherwise) that forces them to hire or even trial someone out of an audition no matter what—that would inevitably result in some unintended and damaging consequences. So as long as that discretion remains, no-hires remain a possibility.

I can’t speak to orchestras, but I’m a member of a premier military band. We’ve had a handful of no hires since covid, and I’m not really sure what the answer truly is.

We can’t offer trials unfortunately, but it does seem like the candidate pool shrank since covid. Our numbers were down, and we had some auditions where frankly nobody sounded very good.

I would guess some people had a hard time staying motivated (totally understandable), lost their audition and section playing abilities, or left the music industry altogether.