I'm excited - only 10 pages left to transcribe!!!

[serenitymusician]

I've been transcribing Symphony No. 3 by Howard Hanson from orchestra to concert band and I'm finally down to the last 10 pages of the 168 page score. Yee ha!!! I've been working on this since August :wow:, missing the months of October, November, and part of December because of other stuff that took priority. Once I'm finished I will condense this piece down to around 15 to 18 minutes in length. I've been in contact with one of the local unversities about performing it. I'll keep everyone posted!!!

Gary

)(~)(~)(~

[KeithW]

I've been transcribing Symphony No. 3 by Howard Hanson from orchestra to concert band and I'm finally down to the last 10 pages of the 168 page score. Yee ha!!! I've been working on this since August :wow:, missing the months of October, November, and part of December because of other stuff that took priority. Once I'm finished I will condense this piece down to around 15 to 18 minutes in length. I've been in contact with one of the local unversities about performing it. I'll keep everyone posted!!!

Gary



I'm curious- how does one learn to do transcriptions? Are there texts on the subject or is it the "school of hard knocks?" Sounds like a very ambitious project!

Keith Walls

[SeanHannifin]

Wow, lots of work!! Congrats on almost being finished, hope it gets played! )(~

[jmpaquette]

I'm curious- how does one learn to do transcriptions? Are there texts on the subject or is it the "school of hard knocks?" Sounds like a very ambitious project!

Keith Walls
Yes, there are texts. Kent Kennan has one, and there are others. However, apprenticeships are best.


Joe

[serenitymusician]

I'm curious- how does one learn to do transcriptions? Are there texts on the subject or is it the "school of hard knocks?" Sounds like a very ambitious project!

Keith Walls

Hi Keith,

For me this goes back several years to my college days taking orchestration class with my prof James Curnow. He had us do a lot of transcriptions. We did everything from transcribing choral works for brass choir to transcribing piano pieces for full orchestras. We used Kent Wheeler Kennan's book "The Technique of Orchestration," which I still have and is my "bible" when I need help. Also, the "Principle of Orchestration" by Rimsky-Korsakov that Gary has posted is absolutely excellent. I hope to go through that course someday when I have more time just to keep up my orchestration chops.

This has been a very ambitious project for me, probably me biggest. I have loved this particular symphony for many years and I feel it's one of those pieces that is seldom heard. I have been wanting to do this for a very long time and I can't tell you how excited I am to be working on it. Using Garritan's concert/marching band library has been a big plus, especially when it comes to "finally" having a decent sounding euphonium as well as all those other instruments you only find in a concert band. Will this ever get published? Honestly, I really don't know. I am renting the score from Carl Fischer and they seem to have expressed some interest. I can tell you this much, whatever band plays this will have to be a college-level band as it is technically a beast! As this is over 35 minutes in length, I will be condensing this down to around 18-20 minutes max.

Well, back to finishing the last 10 pages.

Gary