Alright, here's the deal:in one month I am auditioning for a youth symphony orchestra. The auditions require that I play the following:

1 major scale
1 melodic minor scale
2 Prepared pieces in contrasting style and tempo
Sight reading

The scales I've got down, the sight reading will be improved upon slightly, but my main problem is that one of my two contrasting pieces has my top note right in the middle of the song. By this point, I'm out of breath and whenever I hit that high note, it comes out very, well, bad. Can anyone recommend something that I can do in order to get past this? I'll practice this piece a lot, but any suggestions will help.

If you need more air flow to support that high note then possibilities include:

1. Playing the phrase quieter to conserve air
2. Taking a bigger breath and/or breaking the phrase to take another breath

Try to avoid stretching you lips (you can tense them without stretching them) or using pressure from the mouthpiece onto the lips for high notes - it limits your endurance and try to relax the throat etc to avoid resistance. Make sure you have enough of your lips inside the mouthpiece - although changing your embouchure this near to an audition is probably not a good idea.

What does your teacher recommend?

just out of curiosity, what are you contrasting peices? I'm a having a tough time with a tape audition, where I have to pick two contrasting peices and I'm just not really sure which ones I should play.

My contrasting pieces are "across the stars" and "Imperial March" both by John Williams, from the star wars movies. Across the stars is a slow but high-pitched love song, and Imperial March is, well, a march.....

I think they will know, that these pieces are hard for any horn-players and will not have a problem with a difficulty tone which is bad...

I know this probleme

Good luck ^^