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Do I need to audition?
Students
Any music student (band, orchestra, or vocal) in grades 6-12 who wishes to rehearse with the group can join and rehearse with no audition.
An audition or rehearsal based evaluation is only required to perform at gigs.
- Those wishing to perform at gigs can request a traditional audition any time after joining.
- Alternatively, for students who have been coming to rehearsals consistently for 9-12 months, the director may skip the more formal audition and instead listen to the student play in a rehearsal setting to evaluate their readiness for gigs.
Students who have not yet passed an audition or rehearsal based evaluation are Junior Musicians. Junior musicians rehearse with the group and can request an evaluation whenever they are ready to become a performing member.
Note: To be a performing member, students only need to pass an audition/evaluation one time, not every year.
In addition, if a student plays an instrument but wants to sing or play a different instrument, that student will need to audition as if they were a Junior Musician on that second instrument (or voice).
There may be special cases where at the director’s discretion a student may play another instrument without auditioning.
Adults
Adults are encouraged to join and participate as volunteer adult musicians. Adults do not normally have a formal audition. To begin performing, adult members need to learn the music in the current set list and confer with the director to make sure he agrees the adult is ready to perform with the group.
Audition Instructions
General Instructions for All Students
- Audition music for each instrument can be found below.
- Auditions are usually held during a normally scheduled rehearsal time and use a standard Audition Scoring Sheet.
- When you are ready to audition or if you have questions, contact Mr. Dundore at JoeyD@JDCRockOrchestra.org.
- If you have been coming to rehearsals consistently for 9-12 months, you may skip the more formal audition; instead, the director can listen to you play in a rehearsal setting to see if you are ready for performances.
Woodwind, Brass, String, Keyboard, Guitar, and Bass Guitar Instructions
- Scales: Students will perform a chromatic scale and one octave of two major scales for his/her instrument to be selected by the adjudicators from the scales listed on the audition scale sheet.
- All scales must be played from memory.
- All wind scales are to be played ascending and descending.
- Prepared Pieces: Students must prepare Vehicle by Ides of March and Get Ready by The Temptations. They will be asked to play a portion of each song at the audition.
- To help prepare, students can listen to the JDCRO play Vehicle or watch Vehicle on YouTube.
- You can listen to the JDCRO play Get Ready below:
- Sight-reading: A short sight-reading excerpt will be presented to the student by the adjudicators in the audition room.
Drum Set Instructions
- Students must bring their own sticks. Drum set will be provided, unless the student would prefer to bring their own.
- Snare Drum
- Students will perform a long multiple-bounce roll from pp to ff and back to pp in approximately 20 seconds.
- Two rudiments will be chosen by the adjudicator from the online rudiment sheet. Eight to ten repetitions of the rudiment are sufficient.
- Prepared Pieces: Students must prepare Vehicle by Ides of March and Get Ready by The Temptations. They will be asked to play a portion of each song at the audition.
- To help prepare, students can listen to the JDCRO play Vehicle or watch it on YouTube.
- A short sight-reading excerpt will be presented to the student by the adjudicators in the audition room.
Vocalists Instructions
- Required songs
- Female vocalists will sing Gravity by Sarah Bareilles AND Love Story by Taylor Swift.
- Male vocalists will sing Hey Jude by The Beatles AND Jump by Van Halen.
- Students will have live piano accompaniment provided by the JDCRO for these required songs, or they may sing a capella; however, at least one song must be performed with piano accompaniment.
- A third piece chosen by the auditioning person showing their vocal range will also be judged. Ideally, the third piece should be a song that is not in the orchestra’s set list. For the third song, students can bring a karaoke track on an iPod for accompaniment, can perform a capella, or may have live piano accompaniment. If using JDCRO’s piano accompanist for the third song, JDCRO must receive the piano music (with chords) from the auditionee no less than 1 week prior to the audition.
Audition Music
