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Friday, 10 February 2012 12:43

Written by Andrew Druckenbrod

Forgot to post the PSO YouTube concerto competition to the blog ... so much media these days!

Here is my story and then the AP story below. Nice to occasionally have the AP realize we have a major orchestra in town, and I had to chuckle a little at its line saying the PSO revealed the plan to the AP prior to the press converence! As if it didn't to the other media covering the PSO...but competition aside it is good to have the AP cover this, and Joe Mandak is an excellent reporter and went further on this (as I will when we get closer to it)

AP: Pa. symphony seeks soloist via YouTube contest

BYLINE: By JOE MANDAK, Associated Press



LENGTH: 889 words

DATELINE: PITTSBURGH


Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra officials insist it's not "American Idol" meets
Mozart.

But its new video contest on YouTube does have at least one similarity: voting
by the public. Videos submitted by instrumental soloists will be up for anyone
to watch. The top four vote-getters will get a chance to audition for musical
director and conductor Manfred Honeck. The winner if Honeck picks one at all
gets $10,000 and a paid trip to perform with the orchestra at Heinz Hall this
fall.

But the orchestra says the contest is no classical "American Idol."

"Not at all," said Robert Moir, the orchestra's senior vice president of
artistic planning and audience engagement. "This is applying 21st-century
technology to something we've been doing since orchestras began, and that's
scouting young talent."

Moir and Honeck revealed the idea to The Associated Press in advance of
Thursday's news conference formally announcing the nationwide contest hosted on
the popular YouTube online video platform. The orchestra's Facebook page and
website also have links.

Starting Thursday, people who play any one of 10 instruments piano, violin,
cello, flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, horn, trumpet or harp can upload clips up
to 10 minutes long on YouTube through March 22. The musicians must play certain
concertos without accompaniment, and orchestra musicians and other officials
will judge the clips and post 20 semifinalist videos on April 13. The public
will vote on the finalists until April 30, with the top four winning paid trips
to Pittsburgh to audition for Honeck in June.

(And, yes, the orchestra will even pay for an extra airline seat for any
finalists who play either the cello or harp.)

The winner will play their concerto with the orchestra Nov. 30 and Dec. 2 as
part of its BNY Mellon Grand Classics subscription concert series.

Jesse Rosen, president and chief executive officer of the League of American
Orchestras, said technology is changing the way orchestras interact with their
patrons. Rosen said the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra is one of several with
"tweeting sections" where the audience is free to post Twitter comments about
the performance as it happens. The Washington, D.C.-based National Symphony
Orchestra was one of the first to deliver real-time program notes via Twitter
during a performance in 2009.

But Rosen said the Pittsburgh contest is "very much a leading edge thing.
They're in the forefront. This is not something others are doing."

"Secondarily, it's so fascinating this role change of an orchestra or
orchestras, who have historically been the curators of what gets played and what
represents quality and standards, saying, `You, the public, millions of you, can
have a role in deciding who plays, too,'" Rosen said.

But Honeck and Moir stressed that doesn't mean they're sacrificing quality for
the sake of popular input or appeal.

"The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra has a reputation of being one of the best
American orchestras and we would never allow ourselves to have a soloist who is
not good enough to be accompanied by us," Honeck said. "The quality must be
guaranteed."

How?

"If we don't find somebody at the level that we think is appropriate for our
subscription concerts, we have the right not to put anybody on," Moir said. "We
don't have to have a winner."

"But we're both pretty confident that the level is there just because we've both
been using the Internet so much (to scout talent) and we've seen so many people
who we've never heard of before who are so talented we think that this is
probably going to bring us a lot more of these young interesting artists," Moir
said.

Orchestras typically find new musicians through talent agencies. Honeck usually
holds auditions arranged in cities where the orchestra travels or, more often,
by having the musicians come to the city.

But Honeck and Mori have increasingly shared online video clips of musicians who
are creating a buzz in symphony circles and figured, Why not formalize the
online screening process just once and see what happens?

The orchestra currently has no musicians who have auditioned by video, though
Moir and Honeck said their concertmaster, or first violinist, did come to their
attention through a video clip.

The contest is open only to legal U.S. residents which includes students here on
visas and others noncitizens in the country legally and only to those 18 or over
(19 in Alabama and Nebraska, and 21 in Mississippi) because laws governing such
contests require it. Contestants also cannot be represented by a talent agency
or have previously been represented. That's for legal reasons and because it
would defeat the purpose of finding "unknown" talent, Moir said.

The contest was limited to the United States because laws governing YouTube
videos and the contest itself would have had to be tweaked country-by-country to
allow international contestants. The YouTube platform was selected because it
would have been too expensive for the orchestra to build its own. The endeavor
is being supported by a grant.

Honeck said nobody's sure how well the contest will work. It could be repeated
if successful. It could be a one-and-done. Honeck is even open to the idea of
finding future orchestra members this way.

"Anything's possible," he said.

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