I hope you enjoyed that Heavy Metal interlude, because we’re going back to Classical for a bit.
I’ve been very busy with a program called Dorico Pro. It’s a music engraving program that lets you prepare professional-looking sheet music and scores. I’ve taken several of my much older pieces of music that I’ve meant to do something with one day and I’ve finally done something with them, inputting them into Dorico and getting scores and parts. One woodwind quintet is in the hands of an ensemble, who has played through it already! (They’ve got some work to do, so no, I won’t be releasing the recording.)
The most ambitious work I had on my back burner was an arrangement of Anton Bruckner’s Symphony No. 6, 1st Movement, for Concert Band / Wind Ensemble. Mr. Bruckner is the gentlemen in the portrait that comes with this post (said portrait in the public domain, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons). I first bumped into his Sixth Symphony, 1st Movement in 1988, while waiting to get into one of the performances during Drum Corps International’s World Championships week in Kansas City, Missouri. My wife and I heard it on a classical radio station (she no longer remembers, but she urged me to arrange it).
My first goal was indeed to arrange it for Drum and Bugle Corps, then for marching band (I may still do that one day). However, once I had Dorico, I decided to go the whole nine yards and do a fully-faithful arrangement of the piece for Concert Band / Wind Ensemble. I did not “simplify” anything about the original work: it’s still in the key of A, it’s still in its original meter, most of the original accidentals are retained, and very few other things have been changed aside from the fact that there are no strings in this arrangements (my apologies to the Saxophone section in advance).
I have rendered a recording through NotePerformer 4 and posted it on Soundcloud. Please go to the following link if you want to hear it:
I would appreciate your feedback on this after you hear it. Please leave a comment below.
My next job, of course, is to get an ensemble to play it. I’ve got some ideas. If you’re reading this and you have ideas, contact me!
Thank you for reading!
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