Went to my 3rd orchestra rehearsal and started counting a bit, but I can't seem to count the beat and bars at the same time!!!

I start off ok - 1 2 3 4; 2 2 3 4... but then it all goes wrong... 3 3 4 4; 4 4 4 4... and then I'm out of it!!! So, as long as my rest bit is less than 5 bars I'm ok, otherwise I just have to listen until the next rest or a long slow bit that I can get back into.

I suppose I'm just going to have to practise that counting and it'll soon come to me (hopefully!!!)

I was able to count where I was playing about 4 bars of the same quaver note which then went up and down again. And I seemed to be doing that right, so I'm getting there!!

Still enjoying playing with the orchestra, so hopefully I'm improving!!

Rather than constantly counting 1 2 3 4, 2 2 3 4....15 2 3 4 etc, why not feel the '2 3 4' bit, and just count the first beat (the strong beat) of each bar after the first few bars - once you have the feel of it?

It's not unknown for me to use my fingers. My head is counting 1,2,3,4; but each time I get to 1 I'll bend a finger down, or move it. So say I start with my left hand, at '1' I'll move my little finger out leftwards...on the second '1' my ring finger will join it, on the third '1' my middle finger will move over...and so on. I only use the left hand though, so once over five I move the fingers back rightwards again...

Perhaps this is actually more complicated than counting, but it works for me!

The way you are counting is what you need to do in chamber music, until you know the other parts well enough not to need to count at all. In the orchestra, if you have a reliable conductor, you count his/her downbeats. Of course, not every conductor is reliable in this sense, since you must be able to recognise the downbeat in every bar, so you may need the technique you described also. I posted some other ways of knowing where the music has got to, about half way down this page.