Tchaik's Nutcracker Suite

[DaveTubaKing]

For your entertainment (and perhaps education as to the wonderful versatility of the mighty tuba) I humbly provide a link to my arrangement of Tchaikovsky’s Op 71a Nutcracker Suite (all seven movements and 23 minutes) arranged for tuba quartet –actually 2 Euphoniums and 2 Tubas.

Please listen to the MP3s, which use the OPUS 1 tuba. All four parts are the Tuba, which has been stretched in GigaStudio to accommodate the higher Euphonium parts. In the not to far distant future Herb has promised a Euphonium and I’m eagerly looking forward to that day.

To see the score (which is on the SibeliusMusic website) you may have to download the free “Scorch” software but hopefully you can access the MP3, which is toward the bottom of the page, without it.

Part 1 consists of the Overture and the Waltz of the flowers (and is the best and shortest part if you can only bare to listen to one part)

http://www.sibeliusmusic.com/cgi-bin/show_score.pl?scoreid=69727

And Part two is the five characteristic dances.

http://www.sibeliusmusic.com/cgi-bin/show_score.pl?scoreid=69730.

The actual rendition is very basic I’m afraid the only tweaking being done in Sibelius. I’m not offering this up as an example of top notch rendering but just as a bit of fun.

Enjoy.

[Jonathan Mitchell]

I share your hope that a Euphonium appears. I intend to write a Euphonium concerto sometime soon (yes I was a player of this magnificent instrument once in a Mining Brass Band).

Some points:

1. I like the dynamics. They sound good to me, even though they are difficult to control in Sibelius
2. The reverb seemed a touch too fuzzy for my taste, there is a little loss of definition as a result which for me detracts
3. The arrangements are good. They hold the interest, particularly with the secondary supporting instruments running behind the main melody.
4. Have you used the full range of samples available in your score. Some more variation might add a bit more.
5. Lovely transitions into tuba forte in the dance of the flowers.

All in all, impressed here and I enjoyed listening. Nice job.

[DaveTubaKing]

Thanks Jonathan.

The reverb is the small hall from the NFX reverb in Gigastudio.

I'm almost ashamed to say the only sample used was the looped sustain with release. I just can't be arsed to mess around with loads of extra staves for all the various playing techniques. And this was only a bit of fun.

We've really got to keep the pressure on Herb for that Euphonium and at some stage tenor horn, flugel horn and cornets. the problem is, unlike mosy of the rest of Europe I don't think there's much of a Brass Band scene in vienna. Although Ian Bousfield, ex of Yorkshire Imperials, is of course the VSO's principle trombone. Maybe we should get him to lobby VSL management.

DC

Oh and ps thanks for the review.

[Jonathan Mitchell]

I think I read somewhere that Karl Jenkins may be considering writing a Euphonium concerto. It's such a mellow instrument.

I'm sure I can faintly hear a 'Herb they're right. Why don't wel do a four valve Besson and put it at the top of the priority list'.....

BTW, I've posted a SibeliusMusic review also. Been a while since I visited the site, but I think it will still pop your name up on the opening page which itself tends to draw in a few more listeners.

[DaveTubaKing]

@Jonathan Mitchell said:

I think I read somewhere that Karl Jenkins may be considering writing a Euphonium concerto. It's such a mellow instrument.

well I hate to curtail a burgeoning friendship but I can't think of a composer I'd least want to write a euphonium concerto (unless perhaps it was Andrew Lloyd Webber) Give me a concerto by Birtwistle any day [:D]

[Jonathan Mitchell]

LOL. Well if I had the choice, I'd pick my hero Ludwig to do the concerto. Not a sniff of that without a time machine though. Haven't found one on ebay yet.

Sorry to see you've got such a downer on Karl. Do have a listen to his new Requiem. There is some nice stuff in there. The Introitus is cracking. Having heard how you arranged Tchaik, I'd guess you find Karl to repetitive and lacking counterpointal interest perhaps?

[DaveTubaKing]

Well I'd certainly pefer LVB to KJ. I had the dubious pleasure of playing in a performance of the Mass for Peace a couple of weeks ago having of course heard umpteen times the movment they play constantly on classic FM. I have to say it was dreadful. Its basic compositional skill which is lacking. It's simplistic and naff. OK he has a good turn for a half decent tune but that's it.

The best Euphonium Concerto I've heard to date is the Elgar Cello Concerto. Have you heard the arrangement by Bourgeois - glorious. I realy do think Birtwistle would write a good piece his lower brass writing is so melodic even if you can't whistle it easily.

Yes I'm a sucker for labarynthine counterpoint. Give me Elliott Carter, Maxwell Davies or Sorabji any day.

[hermitage59]

Dave,
I found this very entertaining!

I've been a supporter of Euphonium and Tuba in orchestras for a long time, and often think they 'complete' a brass section, and offer a valuable sound link between trombones and french horns. In addition the wonderful thick warm sound of a Euphonium played well offers another solo instrument sound unique in an overall orchestral sound picture.
Two instruments unfairly maligned, frequently poorly written for, and underestimated by many a composer. A tuba's not just for the bass notes under the trombones, or doubled in the CB's. I've used Tuba with French Horns to create a warmer horn sound more than once.
I like your orchestration, full without being ponderous, an important guideline when scoring for the larger brass.

Well done!

Respect and Regards,

Alex.

[DaveTubaKing]

Cheers Alex - much appreciated.

Yes the role of the tuba in the orchestra is an interesting one. One of the least sucessful but most often used is as a fourth trombone. As a bottom filler for the horns works well as Bruckner knew so well but also Michael Tippet. As an all round bass support for strings woodwind and brass as best exemplified by Prokofiev and Mahler.

Multiple tubas and euphoniums as a section of their own also works and provides a very versatile palette of colours for any composer/arranger. Birtwistle frequently uses2 and 3 tubas in his big orchestral works and operas and has them playing beautiful singing parts across their whole range. Messiaen used three in St Francis of Assisi to great effect with huge walls of sound. Perhaps the best writer for tubas as a section was Havergal Brian. Most notably four (two euphs two bass tubas) in the Gothic (plus 8 others in off stage brass). A composer who was familiar with the extraordinary technical abilities of tuba players from the brass band scene which he exploited but also combined with the "Big Orchestral Sound". 50 years ago Brass Band players were different animals to orchestral players but these days mostly (in Britain certainly) BB players have developed a huge orchestral sound and orchestral players have the same virtuosi technique of the best brass bands (Indeed it is 99% likley that orchestral players today have come up thru the brass band scene). So now we have the best of both worlds.

DC

[Jonathan Mitchell]

No, I haven't heard the Derek Bourgeois version, but I'll look for it. Speaking of Derek, I loved his Dorset Suite. Have a look for it. I think it's somewhere in the Sibelius music website. It has an initial feel much like the Vaughan Williams Somerset suite, but Derek adds something darker in the middle...

Anyhow, let me have one last chance to get you to say something nice about Karl. Have a listen to Amate Adea on his first Adeimus album. I was sheltering in WH Smiths on a rainy Sunday in Aberystwyth when they were playing it and I was moved to immediately buy the album. I also recall being amused that with the local council trying to keep the town 'dry' on Sundays, mother Nature decided that it should be wet. But that's another story.

[DaveTubaKing]

The Bourgeois/Elgar I think is on a Doyen CD with one of the many Child's Brothers (The Holy Trinity of the Euphonium).

I've been a very big fan of Derek Bourgeois for many years - He was/is a fellow tuba player and played in the National Youth Orchestra with John Fletcher.

It's interesting you would pick one of his most traditional and "jolly" numbers where as I would always plump for his big early works - the two Brass band Concertos, The Concerto for Brass Quintet and Band, The Tuba Concerto, The Wine Symphony and the 5th Symphony etc.

If you check out his sibelius music website you will see he has written something like 23 symphonies most of which are on Sibelius. Over the last few years he seems to have been churning out two or three symphonies a year. I think, now that he is retired, he is trying to do a Havergal brian (He who wrote 32 symphonies twenty after he was 80!!!).

I'm sorry but I am a lost cause with the KJ thing - if and when it crops up on Classic FM i'll try to listen without scowling.

DC