Thread: Orchestrated piano works

At one time I knew who orchestrated this, but years make you forget


Stokowski was quite good at orchestrating works

I still prefer the piano all day to this


One of my favorite orchestrations by Stokowski


Stokowski's orchestrations of Pictures at an Exhibition are really good, though I still love Ravel's more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mEFuhWLenTA
Leopold Stokowski's orchestration of Debussy's piano prelude 'La Cathedrale Engloutie' is here played by the Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Geoffrey Simon (Cala Records). It evokes an ancient legend in which the submerged Cathedral of Ys rises slowly out of the sea, its bells ringing and priests chanting, and then sinks slowly back again into the watery depths.
http://www.musicweb-international.co...syengulfed.htm



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfhQa5wM688
Buxtehude's "Sarabande and Courante," dating from the 1600s and originally written for keyboard, was arranged by Leopold Stokowski for a solo electrical Ondes Martenot and Orchestra. This extraordinary version is played here by Cynthia Millar with the BBC Philharmonic conducted by Matthias Bamert.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wl1Ek-0t0gA
Stokowski's colourful edition of 8 movements from Handel's "Water Music" was recorded by the BBC Philharmonic under Matthias Bamert. We hear 5 numbers (Allegro; Bourree; Hornpipe; Andante; and a final Allegro). The superb oboe solo in the 'Andante' is played by Christopher Blake.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOHrOegiF10
The 'Dead March' from Handel's "Saul" is heard here in a dramatic orchestration by Leopold Stokowski, played by the BBC Philharmonic under Matthias Bamert.
http://www.musicweb-international.co...Symphbaroq.htm


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUPgjAxvPkY
Borodin's "Requeim" started out as one of several little piano pieces (others were composed by Rimsky-Korsakov, Cui and Liadov) based on the repeating 'ostinato' children's theme 'Chopsticks' (or 'Tati-Tati' as it is known in Russia). Borodin added the opening words of the Requiem into his piano score ("Requiem aeternum dona eis, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat eis") to be sung by a male chorus. Many years later, Leopold Stokowski arranged this piano piece for a huge orchestra and it received its first recording under Geoffrey Simon's baton in 1992.
http://www.musicweb-international.co...dinRequiem.htm


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuwhaOWRZQQ
Debussy's "La Soiree dans Grenade" (or "La Noche en Granada"), originally for piano, is played in Stokowski's colourful orchestration by the Philharmonia Orchestra under Geoffrey Simon.
http://www.musicweb-international.co...bussynight.htm

Originally Posted by PetrB

F.Y.I. With a very small handful of exceptions, the majority of Ravel's own orchestral works are orchestrations of his original piano pieces.

One of his piano pieces that Ravel himself didn't orchestrate:



I don't know if this is a good orchestration from a technical point of view but I totally love it (more so than the original piano piece).

Originally Posted by PetrB

F.Y.I. With a very small handful of exceptions, the majority of Ravel's own orchestral works are orchestrations of his original piano pieces.

Which is a bit of a bummer, I prefer his original orchestral music to his transciptions

Originally Posted by maestro267

The Hammerklavier was one of the sonatas I was thinking of when it came to ones that might be orchestrated.

That piece probably wouldn't translate well to orchestra.

Boulez - Notations

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGIvd6pjdd0
Mozart's 'Rondo alla Turca,' from his Piano Sonata No. 11 in A, was orchestrated by Leopold Stokowski under the title "Turkish March." It is played here by the BBC Philharmonic under Matthias Bamert and comes from their Chandos CD "Stokowski Encores."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8928BaDCb24
Shostakovich's "United Nations March" (from the MGM war-time musical 'Thousands Cheer') is heard here in the orchestration by Leopold Stokowski (pictured on the left, after a concert in Moscow in 1958). The BBC Philharmonic plays it under Matthias Bamert, a one-time assistant conductor to Stokowski. It comes from a Chandos CD entitled "Stokowski Encores."




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-ee4dJjijc
Frederick Fennell and the Eastman-Rochester Pops Orchestra play Rachmaninoff's Prelude in G minor (originally for piano) as orchestrated by the English composer Edmund Rubbra, from a 1959 LP called "Popovers."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTIaDXIqY3E
Lucien Cailliet (1897-1985) was a composer / wind player who spent many years with the Philadelphia Orchestra as both clarinetist and house arranger. His orchestrations of three Rachmaninoff piano preludes were recorded in 1950 by Eugene Ormandy and have been reissued on the Pristine label: (a) Prelude in C# minor; (b) Prelude in G major; (c) Prelude in G minor.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZG-90nvs0cQ


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4UyUCbqcId0
Sir Henry Wood's transcription of Debussy's famous piano prelude dates from 1919 when he first introduced it at one of the Proms Concerts which still bear his name today. His scoring requires a large orchestra that includes a gong, tubular and mushroom bells, two harps and organ. Wood made his version as a memorial tribute to Debussy who had died the previous year. (From a 'Lyrita' CD on which Nicholas Braithwaite conducts the London Philharmonic.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gR0mXBLe-s
Sir Henry Wood was an inveterate transcriber of piano works and his orchestration of Rachmaninov's most famous Prelude dates from 1913. The splendid recording heard here was made by the London Philharmonic conducted by Nicholas Braithwaite.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeErAbMS6t8
Sir Henry Wood's version of 'Pictures at an Exhibition' dates from 1915. It was only the second orchestration of Mussorgsky's piano set, the first being that by Mikhail Tushmalov, a pupil of Rimsky-Korsakov. Like the Tushmalov version, Wood's is not complete, since he omits all but the first of the 'Promenades' and makes considerable changes and abridgements to the music throughout. However, when the Ravel version appeared a few years later, Wood's disappeared from view while Ravel's became the pre-eminent transcription of the work, still retaining its place today at the head of over 30 orchestrations by other composers and conductors.
For a Proms concert in 2010 at London's Royal Albert Hall, Sir Henry Wood's arrangement was given a rare revival by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales under its Associate Guest Conductor, Francois-Xavier Roth. Gordon Jacob once described Wood's orchestration as "superior in picturesqueness to Ravel's" with its astonishing array of orchestral effects. On the other hand, as the announcer says at the end, it is very "over the top." No wonder the Proms audience went wild!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTY9kmzr4Lc
Sir Adrian Boult and the London Philharmonic play Jeremiah Clarke's "Prince of Denmark's March" (a keyboard piece formerly known as Purcell's "Trumpet Voluntary") in Sir Henry Wood's splendidly gargantuan orchestration.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVbuhkLjs4M
Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor was performed at the First Night of the 2004 Proms in two parts: the Toccata was played on the Albert Hall organ by Martin Neary, while the Fugue was given in Sir Henry Wood's orchestration. The BBC Symphony was conducted by its then Chief Conductor, Leonard Slatkin.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zM5aUh-FgI
The "Funeral March" ('Marche Funebre') from Chopin's Piano Sonata No. 2 has been orchestrated by several musicians, including Elgar and Stokowski. Sir Henry Wood introduced his own version during the 1895 Proms. It was last heard at the Proms in 1943 under Basil Cameron's direction.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TcdwBrDlmQ
This Gavotte comes from the Sonata No. 6 in E major for Solo Violin. It was transcribed for full string orchestra by Sir Henry Wood and recorded in the 1950s by George Weldon and the London Symphony Orchestra on a Columbia LP.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pofeVt2ontM
Sir Henry Wood, founder of the Proms in London, conducts his Symphony Orchestra in his own arrangement of this traditional Russian folksong. From a 78rpm disc made in 1930.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQcJHk6b7PM
Sir Henry Wood's "Suite No. 6" was devised as a kind of successor to J. S. Bach's own Orchestral Suites. Its six movements come from a variety of sources and the first of them is the Prelude in C sharp minor from Book 1 of the Well-Tempered Clavier. Wood's scoring is fleet and gossamer and rather suggestive of Mendelssohn. This track comes from Leonard Slatkin's Chandos CD of Bach arrangements made by assorted conductors.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVBx928SKa4
Sir Henry Wood's 'Suite No. 6' is a set of six Bach transcriptions, arranged from various sources, that includes this heartfelt 'Lament.' It is the 'Adagio' from Bach's 'Capriccio on the Departure of His Most Beloved Brother' in Bb major, BWV 992. In this recording, the BBC Symphony is conducted by Leonard Slatkin.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=53qGpWy_8aw
Sir Henry Wood orchestrated six short pieces by Bach and combined them into what he called "Suite No. 6 for Full Orchestra." This was a kind of follow-up to Bach's own Orchestral Suites and also a "Suite No. 5 for Strings" that Wood had created out of the composer's organ sonatas. The Finale of the "Suite No. 6" is the 'Prelude' from the Partita No. 3 for Solo Violin. It was played at the 2010 BBC Proms by the Royal Philharmonic under Andrew Litton in a concert devoted entirely to Bach Transcriptions..

http://www.musicweb-international.co...od_SRCD216.htm
http://www.musicweb-international.co...od_SRCD216.htm
http://www.musicweb-international.co...conductors.htm


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67t9PFMNxrI
Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor has been orchestrated many times, with Leopold Stokowski's version being the most famous and Sir Henry Wood's the most over-the-top. At the other extreme from both of those is the one made by Alois Melichar, an Austrian composer / conductor who made many recordings for Polydor in the 1930s. His light-weight arrangement of Bach's organ masterwork was recorded in 1939 with the Berlin Philharmonic and is heard here in a transfer by Mark Obert-Thorn for the Biddulph label.
http://www.musicweb-international.co...scriptions.htm


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dc1GEpJVvd0
The programme opens with the famous D minor Toccata and Fugue, orchestrated by Stanislav Skrowaczewski in the early 1960s, when he was music director at Minneapolis. In a sense the rhetorical stance of this music does not transfer so readily to an orchestral delivery as some other Bach pieces do.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lnsKGrm3E3A
This version of Bach's famous Toccata and Fugue in D minor starts off with the organ, played by Leslie Pearson, but when the orchestra comes in the arrangement owes quite a lot to Stokowski's transcription. It was made and conducted by Tutti Camarata (1913-2005) who began his musical career as a jazz trumpeter in New York. After World War II he became a composer and record producer. During the 1960s and '70s he arranged and conducted a number of Decca/London popular classical LPs in 'Phase 4 Stereo' with the Kingsway Symphony Orchestra, so called because it was an 'ad hoc' band of top London musicians which recorded in the famous Kingsway Hall.


http://www.musicweb-international.co...ki_encores.htm

Franz Liszt orchestrated Schubert's Wanderer Fantasy. I have it on this CD box set, but with Brendel playing the Impromptus, Moments Musicaux, Grand Duo, and the real Wanderer Fantasy on three CD's, I haven't listened to it too much. In fact, I tend to stop the CD a few seconds after saying "what the hell is this?"

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Originally Posted by maestro267

The Hammerklavier was one of the sonatas I was thinking of when it came to ones that might be orchestrated.

Weingartner orchestrated it. The only recording of it is just horrible, though.

Originally Posted by MusicSybarite

Weingartner orchestrated it. The only recording of it is just horrible, though.

Indeed. I've got that on the Naxos series of Weingartner's Beethoven recordings. Awful sound (obviously) and really not an interesting enough transcription for me to wish for a more modern recording.

There's a relatively new Mussorgsky Pictures, orchestrated by Peter Breiner, on Naxos. Slightly wacky, but worth a listen. I have to be honest and say I really like the orchestration Vladimir Ashkenazy did....

81cRGu071FL._AC_SL1425_.jpg