Berlin Philharmonic?

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cambrook
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Berlin Philharmonic?

Post by cambrook »

I'm not sure when the audition is/was scheduled, is there any news? eg Who was accepted to play?

I believe that all Berlin Phil auditions are played on stage with no screens, and that ALL the orchestra attend and have equal votes.
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LoyalTubist
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Post by LoyalTubist »

I would suggest going to these weblinks...

http://www.berliner-philharmoniker.de/en/stellen/ (Openings)

http://www.berliner-philharmoniker.de/en/kontakt/ (Contact Page)

For the Tuba position it says:
One Tuba
with obligation for contrabass tuba
It sounds like it is the second tuba player position. Many German orchestras have two tuba positions. You will be REQUIRED to play on a ROTARY BBb tuba.
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Post by Steve Marcus »

LoyalTubist wrote:You will be REQUIRED to play on a ROTARY BBb tuba.
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Dan Satterwhite
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Post by Dan Satterwhite »

It sounds like it is the second tuba player position. Many German orchestras have two tuba positions. You will be REQUIRED to play on a ROTARY BBb tuba.
I would say that a very few orchestras in the world, like the Vienna State Opera Orchestra, have two tuba positions, but most have just one. When they advertise "obligation to play Contrabass tuba", they mean that your main instrument will be F tuba, and you will be asked to play BBb on certain repertoire. Not that one person plays F, and another plays BBb.
Last edited by Dan Satterwhite on Mon May 22, 2006 10:21 am, edited 1 time in total.
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LoyalTubist
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Post by LoyalTubist »

Berlin has had two positions for the past 25 years. I lived there from 1979 to 1982 and I knew both players personally.
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Post by MikeMason »

So what were the practical duties of the 2 players?Did they just rotate?
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Post by LoyalTubist »

No. One played BBb tuba and the other played F tuba. Actually they could do both but this was their assigned job, and there was no getting around it. The contract was so strict they could not substitute for each other.

Most German tuba parts are marked Kontrabasstuba (for BBb) or Basstuba (for F).

I suggest researching before giving answers. When I lived in Berlin, all of the orchestras each had two tuba players with similar contracts. The Contrabass Tuba player is considered the Principal Player--the Bass Tuba player is the Solo Player.
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Post by Dan Satterwhite »

I suggest researching before giving answers. When I lived in Berlin, all of the orchestras each had two tuba players with similar contracts. The Contrabass Tuba player is considered the Principal Player--the Bass Tuba player is the Solo Player.
I don't want to get in a pissing match here, Loyal, but I think perhaps your answers need researching as well. I know Rich Nahatski, who for years was the solo tubist of the Berlin Radio Orchestra, and he played both bass and contrabass tubas (he actually got away with playing CC...a Yorkbrunner). Now called the Deutsches Symphonie Orchester Berlin, their website lists one tubist in the orchestra, Johannes Lipp. Rundfunk Sinfonieorchester Berlin lists Georg Schwark. Berlin Komische Opera lists David Cribb. Ditto for some other big German orchestras: Bamberg (Heiko Triebener), Munich (Thomas Walsh), Dresden Philharmonic (Jörg Wachsmuth), and the Gewandhausorchester (Jürgen Bednarz).

Big opera orchestras tend to employ two players, just like Vienna State Opera. Deutsche Oper Berlin lists Mark Evans and Ulrich Wittke-Hußmann. The Dresden State Opera has two players: Hans-Werner Liemen and Jens-Peter Erbe.

Dan
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