A summary of how I prepared this audition, taken from notes I made in my notebook and my Instagram feed

1/21 Received acceptance from NWS

1/28 Received DSO audition feedback

2/1 Brainstorming how to best improve pitch (main criticism from DSO feedback). Practice with a drone, no vibrato.

2/2 Realizing there are a limited number of keys (only 9 excerpts), and having some revelations about tuning. Sorting music by key center, then focusing on one key at a time.

Starting to understand the connection between pitch, sound, and vibrato.

2/5 Zoom lesson with Mark Sparks

2/7 Thinking about how to practice musical expression, and defining elements of expression (vibrato, dynamic, sound, articulation, tempo)

2/10 Zoom lesson with Cathy Karoly

2/14 Isolating scale passages from the excerpts, transposing them for my technical practice

2/16 Studying Firebird score, starting to assemble my Firebird studies (while tone scales/arpeggios, simplified version, composite version, duet version, etude version)

2/24 Notating Hindemith and Voliere duets for practice

2/25 Practice recording, taking notes

2/26 First anxiety dreams. Adjusting sound in extreme registers by rolling out and pulling bottom lip forward

2/27 Picked up mental training book from library. Still working on embouchure adjustment. Realizing embouchure is a reaction to flute placement

2/28 Getting used to embouchure adjustment. Realized the opening of Faun is based on whole tone scale with chromatic notes, making a chord reduction of Faun accompaniment for practice. Reading mental training book. Went to ballet class for the first time in 4 years!

3/1 Drop the back of the tongue- the final element of the embouchure adjustment that had been missing. Practicing half diminished 7 arpeggios (which are all over Faun)

3/3 Practicing getting in the performing mental zone. Chromatics and trills (I “collected” all the chromatic and trills from the list and practiced them together)

3/4 Practicing my Firebird studies. Recording, taking notes, adjusting. Practicing awareness of breath to be present throughout my day.

3/5 Recording, taking notes, adjusting

3/6 Epiphany about Brahms 4 being in 3/2, not 6. This completely changed the inflections and made it make sooo much more sense. Applied this same concept to Hindemith, phrasing in 2 rather than 6. Practicing speeding up Firebird up to dotted quarter = 68

3/7 Recording, taking notes, adjusting

3/8 Recording, taking notes, adjusting. Changing the tone of voice of my mantra “you can do it” from being an argument to being a statement. Subtle, but really changed the way I felt

3/9 Audition day. Yet another full recording, listening, adjusting