Stefan Schweigert, Solo-Fagottist with Berliner Philharmoniker Masterclass

ZHdK Bassoon Studio photo with Stefan Schweigert.

Stefan Schweigert and the ZHdK Bassoon Studio
celebrating at Vapiano Italian Restaurant.

Stefan Schweigert, Solo-Fagottist with the Berliner Philharmoniker gave a two-day masterclass at ZHdK on October 15-16.  I hope to upload some audio clips from the class soon!  

Mahler 5 Generalprobe

This morning I attended a generalprobe withTonhalle-Orchester Zürich playing Mahler 5.  Interesting to watch Zinman and the orchestra at work.  


The orchestra was preparing for the following concert that night.


Dienstag, 27.09.2011, 19:30 Uhr
Grosser Saal

Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich
David Zinman, Leitung

Franz Schubert
Sinfonie Nr. 7 h-Moll D 759 Die Unvollendete
Gustav Mahler
Sinfonie Nr. 5 cis-Moll

Karen Geoghegan Performs in Zürich

Dienstag, 20.09.2011, 19:30 Uhr 
Grosser Saal

Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich

Jonathan Nott, Leitung
Andreas Brantelid, Violoncello
Karen Geoghegan, Fagott
Christoph Ess, Horn

Gioacchino Rossini
Ouvertüre zu Il viaggio a Reims

Camille Saint-Saëns
Konzert Nr. 1 a-Moll op. 33 für Violoncello und Orchester

Gioacchino Rossini
Konzert B-Dur für Fagott und Orchester

Richard Strauss
Konzert Nr. 2 Es-Dur für Horn und Orchester

Matthias Lesson #3

Saturday, September 17, 2011 @ 10:00-11:30, ZHdK

Comments:

• Scales - Slow/fast, alternate
• All forte, big sound
• Make good phrase upwards
• better not to breathe
• catch the high e
• Just to play more with the notes
• Scale is different when you start on a different note
• Swing
• Find the perfect legato, tension, and timing
• If you have something inside, people will feel it
• Feel good when you play
• Strengths and weaknesses
• Play offensively, no doubts
• There's no reason to feel small

Excerpts:

• Figaro - 
• Watch standing position - must stand in audition
• watch rushing
• feel in 1
• Watch fingers, quiet
• Listen to the internal phrases
• Drive through the phrase, listening to the line
• Make everything beautiful
• Air goes very quickly
• Just let it go
• Always rolling
• Heavy air on beginning
• Help your body feel the tempo
• Figaro - 2nd solo
• Rounded staccato
• Short, with body
• More air, glue more personality to notes, more intensity
• Take care of the vibrato
• Light and swing
• Follow the line, more direction
• Have joy, have fun
• Tempo needs to be more even
• Use tongue a little more at beginning of notes
• Big spurt of air
• More line
• Ravel - Alborada del Gracioso
• Very soloistic
• Loud/free
• Very extroverted
• Loud A
• Faster grace notes
• Watch finger placement
• So much air!
• Be in the moment, don't know what coming
• Air
• Take more time, slow/quick/slow
• Need big/loud/beautiful reed

Tonhalle-Orchestra Zürich Concert

Today marks the official start of my grant.  Celebrating this awesome day at Tonhalle :)

Freitag, 16.09.2011, 19:30 Uhr

Grosser SaalTonhalle-Orchester Zürich

David Zinman, Leitung
Klaidi Sahatci, Violine

Bedrích Smetana
Die Moldau

Edouard Lalo
Symphonie espagnole d-Moll op. 21 für Violine und Orchester

Maurice Ravel
Une barque sur l'océan für Orchester

Claude Debussy
La Mer L 109, trois esquisses symphoniques (4 bassoons!)

Mehrspur Jazz Concert

Attended the Season Reopening at Jazz Club Mehrspur last night.  Had a great time! - September 10 @ 21:00

Street Bassoon!

I was so excited to see a bassoonist playing near Lake Zürich today!  

Matthias Lesson #2

Below are some general notes I took after my lesson.

Saturday, September 10, 2011 @ 10:00-11:30, ZHdK

Comments:

• Stay straight, bassoon comes to you
• JUST TRY
• Play fast
• Write down tempos
• Always find the beautiful line
• note by note
• Stand with stability
• Air is the most important thing you can do
• Basic energy should always be growing
• Save the feeling
• Play 2x slow and 1x fast
• Don't forget the music
• Not everything in life isn't fun
• Go to your extreme
• Octaves - What's happening in the last moment?
• Take care in the moment
• Vibrato
• Can't put one vibrato on all the notes
• Really fast air
• play with big sound

Opernhaus Zürich Masterclass

Anne Gerstenberger, solo bassoonist with the Opernhaus Zürich, recently taught the Studienwoche Master Orchester at ZHdK.  (She has one of the highest paying positions in the music field!)  The masterclass started on Monday, September 5 and ended on Thursday, September 8 from 14:00 to 17:00 each day. Below is a list of the excerpts we worked on.

• Rigoletto
• Don Carlos
• Otello
• Meistersinger von Nurnberg
• Verkaufte Braut
• Nussknacker
• Figaro
• Cosi fun tutte
• Pulcinella
• Sacre du Printemps
• Bajazzo
• Barbier von Sevilla
• Zauberflote
• Carmen
• Liebestrank
• I vespri siciliani
• La gazza ladra

There were four ZHdK students that participated in this Studienwoche.  This class is a required course through ZHdK.  Anne had each of us draw numbers each class to determine who played first and last.  

Anne provided great feedback on each of the excerpts.  She paid particular attention to explaining what an opera audition panel may be listening for while playing each of the excerpts.  My notes from the class are below.

• Carmen 
• Rhythm, trill - make metronomic
• Need to hear all the notes
• Play both bassoon parts in the straight 16th note section
• Make sure there is no fuzz in the sound
• All registers should have the same quality of sound
• Practice with another bassoonist
• Magic Flute
• Play with a cellist, play light
• Rhythmical
• With 16th notes, play the first sixteenth a little longer 
• Piano and fortes should have the same energy
• Meistersinger
• Rhythm
• Make the notes speak all the same
• Otello
• Act 3 - Double tongue (cu - make very clear)
• fingers and tongue together
• Listen for the whole scale
• Watch air on Gb
• Play with cello
• Rigoletto
• Rhythm should be in the head, not fingers
• Don Carlo
• Legato and slurring - listened for in audition
• Finger the F# with the low D key
• Figaro
• Pitch - watch to make sure quarter note after 16th note group is not sharp
• Tempos in different solos same
• add tonguing in opera audition
• Make all notes clear, hear all the notes in the right place
• 4 bar phrases
• Make a line for yourself
• End your phrases
• Play what's on the page
• Hear the tongue, but not as an accent
• Opera setting with 3 cellos and 2 bassoons
• Not to show how big your sound is
• 274, very staccato
• Play with the lock on
• Watch air stream
• Donizetti
• Watch time with harp
• Cosi fun tutte
• Steady tempo
• Stress the first 16th
• Watch G/F#'s
• Make sure to have enough air
• Feel in 1
• Create a line
• Nussknacker
• Short
• Strive for same articulation high and low registers
• Practice slow
• Start pp
• Unison with bassoon 2

General Notes:

- Take time to change your reed

Schubert and Tonhalle-Orchester

Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich plays an all Franz Schubert concert tonight!


Dienstag, 06.09.2011, 19:30 Uhr 
Grosser Saal

Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich
David Zinman, Leitung
Andreas Janke, Violine

Franz Schubert
Konzertstück D-Dur D 345 für Violine und Orchester
Franz Schubert
Sinfonie Nr. 5 B-Dur D 485
Franz Schubert
Polonaise B-Dur D 580 für Violine und Orchester
Franz Schubert
Sinfonie Nr. 6 C-Dur D 589

Scheherazade Concert!

A ZHdK student is playing with the Symphonisches Orchester Zürich at Tonhalle tonight and gave my friend and I tickets to hear them perform.  I can't wait to hear Scheherazade for the big bassoon solo!


September 5, 2011 @ 19:30
Symphonisches Orchester Zürich

Claude Villaret, Leitung
Boris Mersson, Klavier

Mersson, Spiel der Komodianten
Mozart, Klavierkonzert D-Dur
Rimsky-Korsakov, Scheherazade 

Ronald Karten Masterclass

Ronald Karten, solo bassoonist with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, gave a masterclass from 14:30 to 17:00 at ZHdK today.  We played the following excerpts for him.

• Rigoletto
• Don Carlos
• Otello
• Meistersinger von Nurnberg
• Verkaufte Braut
• Nussknacker
• Figaro
• Cosi fun tutte
• Pulcinella
• Sacre du Printemps
• Bajazzo
• Barbier von Sevilla
• Zauberflote
• Carmen
• Liebestrank
• I vespri siciliani
• La gazza ladra

These excerpts were taken from the ZHdK Orchesterprobespielstellen Fagott that I will be participating in from September 5-8 with Anne Gerstenberger, solo bassoonist with the Opernhaus Zurich. 

Matthias Lesson #1

Today was my first lesson with Matthias for the fall semester, although I did take several lessons with him last summer when I visited in May 2010.  Now I'm one of his students!  


A typical lesson will last for 1.5 hours, and we will meet at least once a week.  I have already scheduled all my lessons for the entire semester.  Some weeks I have a couple of lessons just a couple days apart.  I will be video taping each lesson so I may go back and watch for further study.  


Below is a list of the notes I took during the lesson and after watching the lesson back on video.  Most of the comments are really specific to my playing, but I thought people might be interested in what I am learning while studying abroad.

Friday, September 2, 2011 @ 10:00-11:30, ZHdK

• Technique Program (1 hour) - Chose specific scale and play in program; 1 technical etude; 3 excerpts - use two tempos in the beginning 
• Play straight, focused, and stable
• Practice making a musical idea
• Warm up with low notes to relax
• Beginning of practice is like jogging
• Always play with a big sound, straight sound to start
• Big soloistic sound
• Practice with every connection - all difficult notes and unstable notes - chromatic
• Feel really comfortable when you play
• Stay focused and in the music
• Be totally inside what I'm doing
• Make air in change of the notes, and do air to the end of the notes
• Hear the phrase to the end of the note (small crescendo)
• Make everything attractive
• Practice all the systems
• Air, phrase, intonation
• Activate everything, all senses should be really focused
• Create "tension" in the sound
• Incorporate all your body and nerves
• Focus to the air 
• Fingers close to the instrument
• If you feel relaxed, you do not work
• Play up and down
• Feel good connections - helps with legato
• Just write it down one time (Technique Program)
• Do many times
• Watch fingers
• Make different patterns with difficult passages
• Start on different notes, go fast 
• By keeping your fingers close, you have more time to think
• Start with short phrases and add
• Practice conditioning, controlling breath, and long playing with control
• Play with good air and straight notes
• Lots of sound
• The head always finds something to stop the exercise, so just keep going!
• Don't make a stop, and don't take it off
• The body will learn to relax
• Give character to the phrase
• Not maximum of sound - balance of sound and phrasing
• Have inside phrasing
• Play slower for good intonation
• 20% talent, 80% work - practice - playing, playing, playing!

This year is going to be awesome.

Tonhalle-Orchester Opening Night

Tonight was the opening concert for the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich!  The concert was amazing!  They even served complimentary champagne and Sprüngli's chocolate to the audience members!  Below is the program from tonight.  

Donnerstag, 25.08.2011, 19:30 

Grosser Saal

Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich
David Zinman, Leitung
Maria João Pires, Klavier

Anders Hillborg
Cold Heat
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Konzert Nr. 27 B-Dur KV 595 für Klavier und Orchester
Ludwig van Beethoven
Sinfonie Nr. 3 Es-Dur op. 55 Eroica


Here is a link to the Tonhalle bassoon section!
https://www.tonhalle-orchester.ch/index.php?id=20&uid=51&L=0

David Zinman is an American conductor, and he studied violin at the Oberlin Conservatory! He has been the music director of Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich since 1995.  He will be holding a conducting course from March 30 to April 5 on the following pieces at ZHdK.  I will be playing the contrabassoon.  Looking forward to this!

Arnold Schönberg: Kammersinfonie E-Dur, op. 9
Richard Wagner: Siegfried-Idyll

The Music School

Above is a picture of me behind ZHdK in the flower garden.
August 10, 2011

During a two-semester academic year at the Zürcher Hochschule der Künste (Zürich University of the Arts), I will document varying audition system procedures of European orchestras.  I will meet for weekly bassoon lessons with Tonhalle-Orchester principal bassoonist and professor at the University, Matthias Rácz.  He will provide an essential bridge towards the artistic understanding of playing a qualified orchestral audition in Europe.  I will meet with Hans Agreda, contrabassoonist of the Tonhalle-Orchester and Artan Hürsever, principal bassoonist of the Zürich Opera.  These professional musicians will act as mentors and will provide knowledge of European performance standards and expectations.

Matthias uploaded a number of audio samples to his website, if you're interested in listening.
http://www.matthiasracz.de/hoerbeispiele.html

The Zürcher Hochschule der Künste offers the widest range of subjects and courses compared to any other Swiss higher education institution with elite faculty, differing specializations, and talented musicians.  My studies at the University will include a one-year voluntariat position with the Zürich Opera which includes regular rehearsals and performances. I also have the opportunity to perform with the Bern Symphony.  Both positions must be won through a professional audition process.  Valuable orchestral audition perspective will be gained during this music study in Zürich.  Skills acquired throughout this academic pursuit will allow for educated stylistic choices and audition proficiency in Europe.  I will learn further instrumental, theoretical, and musical techniques during group chamber music coaching, collegiate master-course involvement, and orchestral ensemble immersion.  Each of these components will contribute to understanding the systems of European professional orchestra auditions.

The Herbstsemester begins on September 19, and I am getting really excited!  

Let me know if you have any questions about the application process into the Hochschule. It's pretty straight forward, but can be intimidating when it's all in German. 

Orchestra Audition Questions

Hi Friends!

What would you like to know about orchestra audition procedures in Europe?  Are there specific orchestras that you'd like to know more about or that you're thinking about auditioning for?  Are there teachers or conductors you would like to me to interview? 

Here are some questions that I came up with.  

• What do you do to prepare for an audition? 
• For which orchestras have you auditioned?
• What audition system did the orchestra follow?
• What makes a successful audition?  Unsuccessful audition?
• Why do orchestras hold auditions?
• How is the orchestral job changing, if at all?

 Let me know what you think, and thanks for reading!

My Project Overview

This is my first post in my blogging attempts to document my time as a Fulbright Scholarship recipient in Zürich, Switzerland (2011-2012)!  I have spent the past couple of weeks familiarizing myself with the city. I begin studies as a graduate student at the Zürcher Hochschule der Künst on September 19!  I will work intensely with Matthias Racz, solo bassoonist of the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich.  


My goal while living in Switzerland this year is to better understand American and European orchestral audition systems.  As the year progresses, I hope to share my video interviews with professional musicians, conductors, orchestra committee members, and students.  I also intend to discuss my personal observations, experiences, and opinions of the orchestra audition procedures in Europe.  I will post pictures and provide questions for open discussions.


Thanks for reading!