The notes are perfect and the performance is polished -but according to some Ohio University music majors, preparing for a recital is as athletic as any sport.
Undergraduate performance majors are required to give junior and senior recitals. Juniors give half-recitals, which are at least 30 minutes, and seniors give full recitals, which are at least 50 minutes, said Rebecca Rischin, a clarinet professor.
Students must have a hearing in front of faculty members prior to the recital, she said.
A hearing is just like an exam before the recital
Rischin said. The faculty hear selections from the recital and determine if the performance is of a high enough level to go on.
Kwok Lui, a senior piano performance major, said he should be ready for his recital in late January and will start auditioning for graduate school in February.
Grad school is beneficial for performance majors because teaching is often necessary before securing a job as a concert performer, he said.
It's really difficult to make a career of just performing Lui said.
He began building the repertoire for his senior recital shortly after his junior recital in March.
It's a long process he said. Slowly you learn the notes and just keep practicing.
Graduate students give one degree recital in winter or spring of the second year, graduate clarinet student Jessica Vansteenburg said.
Vansteenburg has picked the pieces she will perform for the recital, but she also is gearing up for auditions into a doctoral degree program. It is important for the pieces to be different styles, from different time periods and countries, she said.
Different areas of the world have different styles
Vansteenburg said.
And between choosing pieces and practicing, the recitalist has to decide what to wear and what to feed the people afterward
Vansteenburg said.
If you're going to perform in heels
practice in heels
she said.
Julie Whitt, a senior music education and oboe performance major, also said much more goes into the recital than just practicing. Things like keeping pitch and being in tune are harder tasks than some would think, she said.
A lot of people think you play
and it just comes out
Whitt said. There's a lot more that goes into it
like the theoretical part of it
that people don't know about.
Whitt takes 22 credit hours this quarter and spends about four hours a day with her oboe, including an hour spent making her own reeds. Because everybody has a different embouchure -the way in which the mouth is held while playing -most oboe players have to make their own reeds, she said.
And, she said, a wind player also cannot forget to choose a dress in which she can freely breathe.
Finding accompaniment, and then finding the time to practice with the accompaniment, is another undertaking in itself, Whitt said.
It's very hard to get together to rehearse
