Use the Heckelphone please

I've actually written for Tubax before. It was a Saxophone Choir, but still!

my band director wouldn't let me march it :closedeyes:

It just sounds like a cor anglais... Is it really worth being in the orchestra?

Actually, the bass oboe is very hard to distinguish from the cor anglais. The heckelphone has a warmer timbre, and a wider useful dynamic range. In some player's hands, it can sound like a cross between cor and tenor sax (they have fairly similar bore profiles, after all). You can actually hear a heckelphone in an orchestra: with a bass oboe, one has to score pretty thinly for it to be audible (cf. The Planets). If you can hear the difference between a tenor sax and a bari sax, you should have no trouble distinguishing between heckelphone and cor anglais.

Where have you heard it?

my band director wouldn't let me march it :closedeyes:

Not really made for marching... ;)

I think you'd be sorry if you tried :wacko:

There is the

Why write for the sound of the heckelphone if you can be satisfied with the sound of a bassoon? :(

Why write for the sound of the heckelphone if you can be satisfied with the sound of a bassoon? :(

If the bassoon timbre is what you want, by all means, score for the bassoon. The heckelphone is a different timbre altogether. Or if timbre is of no concern, just write everything for piano.

The point is rather that the heckelphone provides another color for your palette, something besides the old standards of oboe, English horn, bassoon, and contrabassoon.

I do not agree that the Heckelphone can easily replaced by Bassoon or other similar... The Heckelphone timbre is unique, maybe if you want to perform some work that calls for Heckelphone and you have it all except the Heckelphone, and you really want to perform that work, well, you may find a "replacement" for the moment but is not a very good idea....

....I thing the Heckelphone is not so rare like other instruments some have compare with... and I do agree we must cread demand for it, I see some new composers are already writning for this instrument, I'm glad...

My Post is not an "imperative order" for composers, it's just a suggestion, some way to remember you that the Heckelphone exists, lives, and sounds just great... you don't necessary have to use it always, perhaps in some future project i don't know... you're the boss of your own scores...

...I'm not sure but I think the most important orchestras (London, Paris, Chicago, etc.. )can perform works with Heckelphone without any problem...

and believe me when I tell you, even with the Oboe, English horn, Bassoon, Contrabassoon presents in the woodwinds, there is much to do for the Heckelphone too....

... The Piccolo heckelphone might be indeed completely unusable for the moment

... The Oboe Musset (or Oboe Piccolo), mmmm...I don't know how many of these are playing arround...

The point is rather that the heckelphone provides another color for your palette, something besides the old standards of oboe, English horn, bassoon, and contrabassoon.

I don't understand where you disagree with me. If you want the very particular sound and timbre of the Heckelphone, but are still satisfied with the sound of the bassoon, why write for the heckelphone if you're more likely than not to never hear a performance of your piece played by the heckelphone?

Why? Because you wrote it for Heckelphone and you're NOT satisfied with a replacement. That's the kind of attitude you need if you want to get what you want. Unless you want to be a pansy and not fight for what can be yours. If you were performing a movement of the Nutcracker and needed the Celesta, but your school didn't have one, wouldn't you want to go to the administration/director and say "Hey, why don't we have a Celesta?" You'd try and see if there was a way to get one. Would you be happy replacing it with a vibraphone? Glockenspiel? Would Tchaikovsky? I really can't think of anything that really sounds like a Celesta that isn't a Celesta. Same thing with the Heckelphone. Say you want that dark sound like an English horn, but lower in range, a heavy, ponderous sound, and the bassoon sounded too nasel and light hearted. Sure, play it on bassoon. It's not the intended effect, so you'll be as happy as Tchaikovsky having his Celesta part played on a piano or Wagner with his Wagner tuba parts played on (French) horns. Hell, Wagner wrote for instruments that didn't even loving exist! And what'd they do... make a few eventually ... and it worked.

Maybe Mr. LeBlanc's octobass clarinet will come out of hiding if more people write for that too... many sources already note that multiple composers have written for the instrument - it generates enough attention, it just needs a little more.

There are very many instruments out there that are not used in a traditional orchestras, so why single out the hecklephone? Why not write a concerto for hydraulophone?

I'm surprised to find it has been done, but still, you get my point. There are too many interesting instruments out there that COULD be integrated into an orchestra, but if we started integrating all these it would all be too big.

Well, "too big" probably isn't the reason, as you can always just leave out other instruments instead. "too expensive" is probably more like it. If you really want very special instrumentations (that go beyond one or two rarer instruments) it might often be better not to think in terms of classical orchestras in the first place and write for a more open, mixed ensemble (which incidentally also tend to be more open towards contemporary music than your average orchestra).

Would like to restore this...

(this was one my first threads, so I may seem different than now :D but I haven't changed my mind that we should use the Heckelphone)

Use the Ocarina please.

ups, looks like it wasn't a good idea to restore this isn't it ?

Nobody wants to read 4 pages written more than a year ago :facepalm:

I still say, Use the heckelphone, (and I'll try the ocarina :) )

I *will* the Heckelphone as soon as I get my hands on one.

Use the handwhistle. Every has a pair. =]

I already do....

And look at my name, I love the thing :P

I know Graham, I didn't know you when I started this :hippie:

I like you use Heckel again instead Hekla, now you need a new signature, (that one by James is cool but you need a heckelphone there)

I know this discussion is long over, but whether you choose to write for the Heckelphone or not is your discion.

I fell in love with the instrument last year, and i've written several pieces for it this year. (and since sibelius 7 has a heckelphone sound, i know what it sounds like!)

I personally would write for heckelphone, but I also don't know anybody owning it. So currently I can only consider such composition a waste of time, sorry. If anybody on this site has a contact than please send it to me. :)

VOID

I personally would write for heckelphone, but I also don't know anybody owning it. So currently I can only consider such composition a waste of time, sorry. If anybody on this site has a contact than please send it to me. :)

I know a guy who knows a guy who plays a heckelphone with the met in new york. I'll see what i can do.