Odd Group, what to write?

I am thinking of entering a competition... It allows you to write a piece of basically any genre but it has to be written for an unusal group of performers..

namely:

1 flute

1 clarinet and/or bass clarinet

1 violin

1 cello

and percussion playable by one person: No timpani's or large gongs etc.

any suggestions as to a sort of piece that could be orchestrated to that type of group without sounding 'hollow'?

Thanks,

Chris :-)

haha, i'm in it too!

for those who don't know its the sibelius students awards.

i'll be writing a highly polyphonic piece which spreads the instruments accordingly in its own register so basically it won't sound too hollow. yeah, the nature of the instrumentation is hollow, a bassoon or oboe would do good added in it =P

I've found minimalist music overcomes the limitations of very strange groups. I participated in a piece written for piano (me), trumpet/flugelhorn, tenor sax, two baritone voices, and flute. It was entirely pentatonic, with solos for all instruments. For mine, I did some Steve-Reichy hairpin chords. I would say anything in a Reich style would be quite successsful for that group. I would have the percussionist at the marimba, laying down a constant harmonic foundation, then the other instruments doing "18 Musicians" style stuff overtop. Just my two cents.

Also: Bass Clarinet r teh r0x0rs.....;)

I am thinking of entering a competition... It allows you to write a piece of basically any genre but it has to be written for an unusal group of performers..

namely:

1 flute

1 clarinet and/or bass clarinet

1 violin

1 cello

and percussion playable by one person: No timpani's or large gongs etc.

any suggestions as to a sort of piece that could be orchestrated to that type of group without sounding 'hollow'?

Thanks,

Chris :-)

Crikey, when we get together that's the make up of our ensemble though I sometimes play piano as a 6th part. The guy who plays percussion makes most of his instruments from scrap stuff.

You'd be surprised what you can write for that ensemble. It's a quartet with the same spread (near enough) as a string quartet + percussion.

Blarrrgh! It's only open to Australians. That sounded like fun.

Errm, with regards sounding hollow, why don't you just have a piano as your one-man percussion instrument? Or is that not permitted? If that's not allowed, then a large glokenspiel would add colour, or even one of those marimbaphone things.

yeah... definately use some sort of toned percussion instrument... maybe a carillion or bells if you can't use a piano...

Flute, violin, and cello do blend well together (take for instance Bach's trio sonata in c minor from "a musical offering."). I don't know what I'd do with the clarinet, although I'd personally use both the bb clarinet and a bass clarinet so that the clarinet's not on its own. Strings normally go well with just about everything, and flute goes well with clarinet, sometimes... so you just need to blend it all together... don't bring the clarinet into it's squeaky register, and bringing the flute down into its lower register at the time can create very dark, rich sounds together, and can be coupled with the strings, I think... of course, that's my personal opinion.