Orchestration: PART 1 (woodwinds) discussion

Thanks for doing this qc, fantastic to have someone to give us all feedback on our attempts at orchestration

Here are mine, am looking forward to the next lesson:

Hey 920bpm - just a bit about the oboe. If you want a REALLY weak register, move up your oboe part in exercise 1 so it starts on an A or B. THen you will be in the shrieking/difficult register of the oboe. Right now it's easily manageable - you wouldn't believe how much harder it is to get out a high G than a high F.

and thank-you Oboe for that information.

I'm glad that this is turning out to be a REAL masterclass...
Please, make comments, ask questions, not just of me.

Act as though this were a class at university.

Originally Posted by oboeducky

Hey 920bpm - just a bit about the oboe. If you want a REALLY weak register, move up your oboe part in exercise 1 so it starts on an A or B. THen you will be in the shrieking/difficult register of the oboe. Right now it's easily manageable - you wouldn't believe how much harder it is to get out a high G than a high F.

But wouldn't that push that high F out of the range of the oboe?

Also, qc or anyone who knows a bit about this already, would my ex. 2 & 3 "work"? Would I get the effects I described?

Originally Posted by 920bpm

Also, qc or anyone who knows a bit about this already, would my ex. 2 & 3 "work"? Would I get the effects I described?

the "shrill" effect would definately, be there, although the bassoon would not have quite as much carrying power as the bassoon.
ideally, you would have to double with still more instruments to really get a "shrill" effect.

at some point further along we'll start to consider multiple instruments in unison/octave dispositions.

To really get nice rich/loud sounds, it becomes important to layer the instruments more than 2 x 2.

Of course, I'm speaking from an orchestral point of view here. Chamber music is a completely different animal.


For "fullness" of sound, a very important factor is to consider the harmony as a unit.

If you have a 3-note chord and end up doubling only one note of that chord over and over, then you are going to be weakening part of it.

There are many ways to score a single chord, but one of the most effective, and "richest" is to keep the disposition almost exactly as it would be in the overtone series.

In other words if we had a C major chord, starting from teh bottom up you would double at the octave the fundamental "C", then put in a G, then another C, then more densely pack the notes as the register got higher. Until in the highest register you would have literally all the notes of the chord stacked one on top of each other.

This, for example, would be my favourite way of orchestrating a C major chord for woodwinds (with horns). It's not the ONLY way, just one that gives a particular orchestral colour of which I am particularly fond:


Notice which instruments are in octaves, and which are in closer positions.

Here is a recording of that chord:

C Major woodwind chord recording

Again, take into consideration that this is being performed by a sample library, and I also did this very quickly as an example.

Another way to orchestrate the same chord could have had more overlap in the upper register to accentuate the "C" tonic of the chord.
The same principle remains in effect, however, where you space notes further apart in the lower register and closer together in the upper register.

Generally, around and above middle C it is unusual to have octave gaps in the texture.
While two octaves down from middle C it is almost a prerequisite.

Originally Posted by Qccowboy

Notice which instruments are in octaves, and which are in closer positions.

Is that anything to do with this?

Originally Posted by Principles of Orchestration Online

4. Concords (octaves, thirds and sixths) and not discords (fifths, fourths, seconds and sevenths), should be given to instruments of the same kind or colour, except when discords are to be emphasised. This rule should be specially observed in writing for the oboe with its penetrating quality of tone:

I'm about up to the woodwind harmony chapter in that orchestration course as well, but I really didnt get that bit, it sounds really really strict. Can anyone make sense of it?

are your refering to the Rimsky online orchestration course?

If so, well, yes it IS a bit strict, but remember that his goal was homogeneity and a very particular tonal colour.

Yes, it is related.

I tend to accentuate the clarinet sound in octaves, as well as place my horns, when there's only two of them, in octaves.

Don't think of it as "strict" think of it as a sort of guidelines from which to expand.

Oh OK, thnaks for clearing that up

Whats the next best thing to a Finale file qc? I only have Sibelius.

oop. I DID specify in the sign-up thread that I will only work with Finale files for this course.

you COULD use MIDI file, but I don't like that none of the fine-tuning of notation is included.