Excerpt
An extract from a larger work.
What it means
An excerpt is an extract: a section that is detached from a larger work and used on its own. The term (an English word in German usage) is met in programme booklets, music editions, and above all in orchestral practice, where collections of difficult passages — orchestral excerpts — are a fixed part of training and auditions.
Musical use
Excerpts serve different purposes. In concerts, individual movements or scenes from operas and ballet scores are performed when the whole work is out of the question; such excerpts are sometimes arranged by the composer himself, for instance as a suite. In training, orchestral excerpts serve to practise the demands of the profession specifically: they contain technically tricky passages, exposed solos, and places with particular problems of rhythm or intonation. The disadvantage of every excerpt is the loss of context; a passage sounds different when one knows what precedes it.
In an audition for orchestral posts, typical difficult sections from symphonies and operas are played that are known as excerpts or orchestral passages. There are collections of their own for each instrument.
Performance practice
Never practise an orchestral excerpt in isolation without knowing the work: listen to the context, get the score, and settle which parts go along and who has the lead. Watch the tempo markings and which tempi are usual in performance practice; in an audition both are expected. Practise with and without metronome, and record yourself, because self-perception is deceptive with exposed passages. With concert excerpts from stage works, settle the transitions and endings, since editions differ.
Bear in mind that collections of orchestral excerpts detach the passages from their context and often print them without the surrounding bars: get the score and listen to the work before you practise. For auditions it holds that you should know the usual tempi and be able to begin the passage securely even without a run-up. Record yourself while practising.
Note for each passage from which movement and which bar it comes.