What not to do at a staff conductor audition...

For a several years in the middle of this decade, I was the unofficial king of staff conductor (assistant/associate/resident conductor) auditions, with an amazing yield of invites to the semifinal or final round. Unlike instrumentalist auditions, which can accommodate dozens and dozens of live auditions in the first round, staff conductor auditions have to be limited to as many candidates as can be fit into a single orchestra service, which represents a cost of many thousands of dollars. Unfortunately, there wasn't a Subway Club Card type deal where they just automatically gave me a job after my 10th audition. I suppose I was typecast in the conducting equivalent of the Ralph Bellamy role in the 1940s romantic comedy vein -- would have been nice to be Cary Grant just once.

So, learn from my experience! (or have a laugh or two at my expense) Here is a list of suggestions (well, mostly "dont's") based on those many lonely marches onto unfamiliar stages filled with strangers:

• Read the info carefully that you get in the period leading up to the audition and in the packet at the hotel/at the audition site (it wasn't an audition, but I once learned the wrong Mozart symphony for an ASOL conducting workshop). Know with absolute clarity what the audition rep is and how the audition will be run
• If you have carte blanche as to how to use the time, know exactly where you're going to start and stop and how much time you will use for each excerpt
  
• Don't go out on stage without having attended to your bodily needs (including eating) first
  
• Don't change your game plan based on what you hear the candidate before you doing
• Don't forget to take a moment to see where exactly the brass, percussion, harp, piano etc. are located once you're out onstage
• It's like having a blind date with 80 people at the same time -- you just have to hope you connect with enough of them that they'll want to shack up with you for a few years
  
• Don't wait for them to play after your first downbeat -- if you've never conducted an orchestra with a big-time lag, you just have to keep going. You really have to have the music inside you to keep your shit together, though
• Don't forget to study the scores ahead of time
• Don't do a halfassed (or even 3/4-assed) job preparing the preconcert lecture/educational program etc. presentation(s) that you'll undoubtedly be asked to deliver. I slacked on this once (I'd always done well with previous ones), and the result wasn't pretty
  
• Don't be distracted by the obvious hatred between the concertmaster and principal cellist -- it actually has nothing to do with you
• Don't give in on your tempi -- stop and start again if you don't get what you want
• Don't try to save money by staying with a friend who lives further than walking distance away from the audition site
  
• Don't stay up late drinking wine and discussing the vagaries of life with said friend the night before the audition
• Don't assume the next morning that the cab will show up at the time you asked for it 
• Don't mumble on the podium
• Don't start conducting without taking a moment to be still and focus
• Don't forget to breathe
• Don't explain why you want to modify a phrasing/articulation/bowing, etc. 
• Don't make jokes (unless, like me, you can't help it)
• If forced to "rehearse",  focus on "quick wins" -- don't get bogged down by minutae. Fix as many things as you can on the fly with your "conducting technique" such as it is...
• Just make music! If you have a good experience in that dimension, you can't go wrong