askland on January 15th, 2011

Orchestrations of Stephen Sondheim’s Broadway Musicals

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askland on July 16th, 2010

Range of the Bb Clarinet and characteristics of different registers. Low register called the Chalumeau octave. More information on Clarinet construction and use in the orchestra available at: http://www.mti.dmu.ac.uk/%7Eahugill/manual/clarinet/construction.html

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askland on July 14th, 2010

I had not realized before how flexible and nimble the oboe is. Here is an excerpt of the oboe score from Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante, K. 297, third movement. So this is just a note to myself to remember to score more interesting and diverse parts when I write for oboe. We want to keep the oboe [...]

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PDF Download: Guide to Drum and Percussion Notation PDF Download: drums-percussion-notation From: http://web.mit.edu/merolish/Public/drums.pdf Congas, woodblock, gong, and individual drum kit (toms, cymbals, etc.) Also this information on notation and performance for Concert Band Percussion Instruments: by Staff Sergeant Bill Elliott and Staff Sergeant Steven Hearn CONTENTS: Triangles; Tambourine; Concert Bass Drum; Cymbals From: http://bands.army.mil/masterclass/tusafb/mar2001/perc.htm Download PDF: [...]

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I did not like this piece on first listen – then I read about it’s background: the description of Janacek’s unrequited love and pining. And now the piece is very powerful to me. Janacek once wrote: “I maintain that a pure musical note means nothing unless it is pinned down in life, blood and locale; [...]

Continue reading about Leoš Janáček – String Quartet No. 2, ‘Intimate Letters’ (1 of 4)

askland on April 7th, 2010

Adam Guettel is the composer and lyricist for “The Light In The Piazza” – a musical, but really worthy of the title “opera”. I’ll tell you first why Piazza and Guettel interest me, and then following will be more biographical info and article links.

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askland on April 2nd, 2010

Leonard Bernstein. Young people’s concerts. What is Orchestration?. March 8, 1958 Bernstein discusses orchestration beginning with Rimsky-Korsakov live performance examples. He also plays examples of bad orchestration.

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askland on March 17th, 2010

Introduction to Orchestration by Thomas Goss. See my “Orchestration” category here on my blog for more music orchestration study tips.

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Gustav Holst – The Planets Op.32 Mercury, the Winged Messenger Here is an example of the full score and following that is a two piano reduction. I have been racking my brain in several futile attempts to find the most economical and free way to do orchestral sketches on the computer – and I think [...]

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askland on March 17th, 2010

Information on music orchestrators; the geniuses behind the scenes of film music and Broadway musicals. Orchestrators receive music from composers in the form of handwritten or computer printed scores, MIDI files, or a combination of these. The primary role of an orchestrator is to assist the composer in delivering a fully orchestrated score from the [...]

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askland on March 17th, 2010

Piano sketches by Aaron Copland of his Fanfare for the Common Man orchestra work. A look into how the composer prepares an orchestral sketch before full orchestration.

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askland on March 17th, 2010

Insight into how Aaron Copland would sketch his music before full orchestration. Appalachian Spring rough sketch page 15 by Aaron Copland. Copland wrote his orchestra sketches at the piano at a slow pace, often at night. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Copland Aaron Copland sketches can be found here: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/copland/index.html Appalachian Spring second sketch, a little cleaner with more notes [...]

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