As the New York Philharmonic’s orchestra personnel manager, Carl R. Schiebler keeps rehearsals running on time, tracks down substitutes and serves as fixer. Mr. Schiebler, 75, was the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra’s second hornist and later its personnel manager before coming to the Philharmonic in 1986. When he is not taking care of one of his 106 orchestra members, Mr. Schiebler splits his time between his apartment on the Upper West Side and Pleasantville, N.Y., where he lives with his wife, Noriko Whyte, a pianist and music teacher.
Suzanne DeChillo/The New York Times Carl R. SchieblerWhat’s a typical day for an orchestra manager?
Today we have this rehearsal this morning, the first rehearsal for this piece. So I want to check with the conductor and also the stage manager at intermission to make sure things are O.K., or if there is a problem, where to go with it. And I think this afternoon I have to listen to 77 bass trombones. And we have a fund-raising concert tonight that’s brewing. Is that a typical day? Yeah, I guess that’s a typical day.
What kinds of problems do you have to solve?
This morning, we have to settle where everything is going on the stage for this piece. There has been some discussion about what will be offstage and onstage. It’s not that I do it, but they expect us to get everything resolved quickly. Rehearsal time is at a premium. You want everything to be running as efficiently as possible right from the start. So if there’s a problem, you’ve got to get it fixed right away so that the rest of rehearsal, it’s like it would be in a concert. In this particular piece, there’s some offstage players â€" trumpets, choruses, organs â€" so it’s a question of where they’ll be so they can rehearse it that way. That’s up to Alan Gilbert, the conductor, the music director.
How many rehearsals are there before a concert?
Usually, we have three or four rehearsals. An average week is like this one: The first on a Tuesday, they’re reading this piece. Then two rehearsals tomorrow. Then a dress rehearsal Thursday morning, and then it’s performed Thursday, Friday and Saturday and sometimes Tuesday. Basically, your rehearsals are ensemble. It’s expected you know your part by the first rehearsal. Parts are usually available a few weeks in advance. I would imagine people are going to the library this morning to look at parts a couple of weeks from now. We go through an incredible amount of music. It’s very, very fast. But the players, God love them, are incredibly well trained.
How do you go about filling vacancies?
Well, we advertise internationally, and there’s a selection process that we go through. You put together an audition committee of the musicians, and they go through all of the résumés. We get 200 to 300 applications for every position, and so the committee will sit with them and decide which ones they will ask to send a recording of their work. Others, they know them and advance them into a preliminary audition. It depends. Each instrument is different.
Who sits on the committee?
The committee is made up of the musicians. It’s usually the principals of the sections. And then they elect some players. And sometimes you don’t have to. Like in the brass section, most all of the brass players would want to hear the audition, so they’re there. And then in the finals, the music director is there.
For auditions, are the people behind the curtains?
Yes, the screens came in years ago, back in the ’60s and ’70s when you had the youth movement, and you had different minorities applying for positions, so it was just an easy way to make the auditions blind and give everybody a fair chance. It also takes pressure off our players. Say, a member of the orchestra is auditioning for a position, to get an advancement. If there was a principal position open or an assistant principal position open and somebody in the section was auditioning for it, the screen keeps it clean because they’re looking at colleagues. Also, sometimes the players auditioning are students. You can make whatever judgment you have to make. It’s very fair.
What about personality mix, is that important?
I would say 90 percent, 95 percent of the audition is playing. You have to play your way in. Everybody has to play their way in. But then there’s a probation period of 17 months. A lot of times a player is trained most of their life one-on-one with a music stand and all of the sudden, you have to come into a group and be a group player. And it’s difficult. It’s a hard thing to learn. You try to give them the learning curve and help them as much as you can.
And usually we’re successful with that. Sometimes, we’re not. We tell new players, “Don’t buy a house yet.†You’re not really a member of the orchestra until you’re off the probation.
Which instrument is the hardest to fill?
The hardest one that we’ve had lately has been zither. There are zither players out there, but that maybe aren’t trained as well as they should be if you really need one. At this point, we have a couple of leads on zither players. One up north and one in California. And so if and when we need one, we have an idea of where to turn. You have to always be thinking about what’s coming. Or a saw player; we don’t need one right now, but if we do the Khachaturian piano concerto, you know you’re going to need a saw player. “Tales From the Vienna Woods†would require a zither, if you want to do it authentically.
One of our readers asked about polishing the instruments. Is that done by the musicians? Have there ever been complaints that something isn’t shiny enough?
You’re talking about getting Brasso and polishing something until it shines? No, you wouldn’t do that to an instrument. It takes the metal off and it hurts the instrument. That’s something you would have to be very careful with. You’ll find that most players with their instruments will not polish.
This interview has been condensed and edited.
