Arrangements You Have Made

[pml]

Mozart, Berlioz (not Beethoven - arrange him! make it better!), Strauss, Wagner, Mahler, almost all 20th century composers did know a considerable amount on instruments.

Wow! That's quite an over-generalisation, or so it seems to me. I will grant you that by the 20th century, no professional composer had an excuse for not knowing the techniques of instrumentation and orchestration - the books by Berlioz, Rimsky, Strauss, and the scores illustrating their techniques were all readily accessible to anyone with the inclination to study them. Yet you still find examples of composers writing unsympathetically for certain instruments; I'm reminded of statements one occasionally reads, such as, "Did X loathe having violin lessons in his youth? He seems to have a hatred for the instrument, judging by the unsatisfying and difficult lines they are routinely asked to play" (my paraphrase of the general intent).

However, no matter how much they try, unless they re-compose the piece, if the composer did specifically write it for that instrument they aren't going to effectively arrange it, regardless of how knowledgeable.

In which I think you are making the rather large assumptions that the composer has written a piece that is idiomatic for the instrument(s) in the first place, and likewise that the arranger has not attempted to adapt the work to exploit the qualities of the different instrument(s) used in the transcription!

I gather you're against the more-or-less "straight-down-the-line", uncreative transcription from one instrumental designation to another, as opposed to the more creative re-composition of a work to suit the differing instrumentation: wouldn't it have been fairer of you to make that distinction, rather than dismiss all arrangements out of hand?

Admittedly making arrangements is often treated as a routine task undertaken when a given piece of music for a specific type of ensemble doesn't match the instrumental line-up that a certain performing group has available, but even in that case a skilled arranger will be able to add something in the process, rather than drudgingly executing a mechanical copy.

Regards, Philip

[pml]

And of course, composers are always much better authorities on instrumentation than mere arrangers. (Irony alert!)

[Irony understood]

Yes, Broadway and lots of film music being the major exceptions. :D

Which is not to say that there aren't composers on Broadway or in the film and television worlds that can do the whole business: namely, do all of the technical work in addition to the creative. But in practice, the tight scheduling deadlines impose a pressure of time that make it impractical for the vast majority of composers to do this. When I watch a film I regularly look through the credits just to see how many staff were required to translate the composer's ideas into performable music for large ensemble - occasionally you will see as many as half a dozen orchestrators and arrangers working with a prolific composer who simply doesn't have the time to write out 30 staves of film orchestra for several hours' worth of incidental music.

[aldona]

Schubert's "Arpeggione" Sonata - solo part edited & transcribed for alto flute in G.
Still a work in progress - tidying it up and correcting bits here and there.

The next challenge will be learning to play it.
(So many good intentions, so little time to practice.)

Aldona

[Lyle Neff]

Which is not to say that there aren't composers on Broadway or in the film and television worlds that can do the whole business: namely, do all of the technical work in addition to the creative. But in practice, the tight scheduling deadlines impose a pressure of time that make it impractical for the vast majority of composers to do this. [...]

Yeah, but non-film, non-Broadway composers in the past seem to have had schedules just as hectic, yet they turned out to be just as prolific and managed to write their own scores out in full -- with outdated pen and paper, no less.

[allegroamabile]

I am not too fond of this thread going off topic. My original intentions were to ask people what arrangements he or she has made, not to argue if the idea of arranging pieces is lame or not.

[vinteuil]

Oops. My bad as a moderator - then again, the discussion has been carried on by moderators.
Anyways, I gave all I have, which is why I haven't responded much.

[pml]

Mea culpa, for my part. In the "uncreative" mode of making arrangements, I've made numerous vocal re-arrangements or instrumental transcriptions. The silliest one of late was for a performance of Spem in alium where they wanted 15 string parts and 17 brass parts doubling 32 of the 40 vocal lines, plus organ continuo. I'll edit this post later to add some of these in...

[thefrenchhornguy]

Let's see...
I'm attempting to arrange Holst's "Second Suite in F for Military Band" for a full orchestra, mainly because I adore the rich, resonant sound of the full orchestra. I was inspired by the orchestral arrangement of Vaughan Williams' "English Folk Song Suite", which utilizes similar thematic material and instrumentation to Holst's suites for band.

[allegroamabile]

Are you sure that the Holst is not already orchestrated?

[Melodia]

It was transcribed to orchestra by Gordon Jacob under the title "A Hampshire Suite". But that's not to say another one can't be made.

[Lyle Neff]

I guess I didn't answer the original question of the thread.

Yes, I've arranged some other composers' music. On ISMLP I've uploaded my orchestration of Glazunov's "Gavotte," Op. 49, No. 3, from undergraduate school:

• http://imslp.org/wiki/3_Pieces,_Op.49_% ... exander%29

The vast majority of my other transcriptions are for organ solo, mainly for my use when I was a church organist. Most of them are listed here (none are published):

• http://copland.udel.edu/~lneff/vitaplus ... scriptions

Also as organist I wrote many free arrangements of hymn tunes, of which 14-15 are currently in production for publishing by Augsburg Fortress (hopefully later this year).

[allegroamabile]

What kind of hymns, Baptist or more liberal Protestant?

[Lyle Neff]

What kind of hymns, Baptist or more liberal Protestant?

I think these are the tunes in the planned collection, in order of tune name (there might be one missing):

• Aberystwyth (Parry) -- "Jesus, Lover of My Soul"
  Dix -- "For the Beauty of the Earth"
  Es ist ein Ros' -- "Lo, How a Rose E'er Blooming"
  Un flambeau -- "Bring a Torch, Jeannette, Isabella!"
  In Dulci Jubilo
  Kelvingrove
  Kingsfold -- "O King of Glory, David's Son"
  Lasst uns erfreuen / Divinum mysterium -- "All Creatures of Our God and King"/ "Of the Father's Love Begotten"
  Laudes Domini -- "When Morning Gilds the Skies"
  Pisgah -- "The Lord's My Shepherd, I'll Not Want"
  Sussex Carol -- "On Christmas Night All Christians Sing"
  Thaxted -- "I Vow to Thee, My Country"
  To God Be the Glory
  Valley -- "We Shall Walk through the Valley in Peace"

[SeanMartin]

Given my own little corner of the musical universe, many of the composers who work I admire may have orchestrated their work, but the parts are long gone. In some cases, we're lucky to have the piano reduction and a few notations. So for me, it's an exercise and a fulfilling hobby to take one of those scores and see what it *might* have sounded like with a salon orchestra of the day. I have no illusions that my work is anywhere near authentic, but just the attempt is sometimes enjoyable enough. For example, one of the scores I've started tinkering with is for a virtually unknown musical called CROCODILE ISLAND by Morgan and Johnson, written in the twenties. It's a wonderfully mindless little piece, complete with a patter song, a "real slow rag", and other idiomatic song forms. And exploring the sound has been great fun. True, it's not for the serious-minded, but we amateurs need our outlets too.

[allegroamabile]

If you like musicals so much Sean Martin, you should fiddle around with Leroy Anderson's Goldilocks. There is a lot of neat things going on in that work.