How to Conduct an Orchestra

Conducting an orchestra is not as easy as it looks. Orchestra conductors study music for years before stepping up on the podium. They're usually accomplished musicians themselves who have at least a general knowledge of all the instruments and how to play them.

Instructions

1. Read music. A conductor needs to know how to read various types of music. All of the orchestral instruments don't play in the same key or even the same clef. Percussion music looks different from the music written for stringed instruments. In order to conduct an orchestra, you need to be an expert in reading all kinds of music.

2. Get rhythm. The primary responsibility of the orchestra conductor is to keep the beat. All of those instruments playing without a conductor couldn't stay together. They need a common beat. To keep the beat, the orchestra director needs to understand the time signature of the music so that she can signal the down beat, or major beat of each phrase. She also needs to know if the music is counting three, four, six or eight beats to a measure in order to keep all the musicians going at the same rate.

3. Locate the instrument sections. An orchestra conductor signals the cellos when to begin playing after a long rest so that they all begin at once. The conductor must know which instruments are playing the music on each line of the score. He then must know where they're sitting in the orchestra, so he can cue them when it's time.

4. Interpret the works of various composers. This is important because a certain amount of interpretation is required for conducting each piece. The musicians look to the conductor to signal how loud or soft they should play. It's up to the conductor to interpret what the score so that all of the musicians play each piece of music the same way.