Your Five Favorite Orchestrators

[classicalgeek]

I was listening to Ravel's Daphnis et Chloé last night (in Seiji Ozawa's wonderful performance), with the score courtesy of IMSLP, and the orchestration just left me speechless. Ravel's gift for orchestral color is pretty well unmatched - how is it that even in his busiest passages, you can hear "right through" the music? That he maintains that wonderful sense of clarity?

I'll admit it - I'm a sucker for great orchestration! When I'm sampling a composer's orchestral music for the first time, this is part of what hooks me in (or leaves me indifferent.) Can he or she really write for the orchestra? If the answer is "yes", I'll enjoy the music that much more.

I didn't see a topic in the "Polling Station" thread, so I thought I'd start a discussion.

Here are my top five:

1) Ravel
To me, Ravel is the master orchestrator! He deploys an infinite variety of colors and effects, and he has that transparency, that clarity, that keeps it endlessly interesting for the listener.

2) Mahler
Whether it's a passage of utmost delicacy (the end of the Adagio of the Fourth Symphony or the end of the Ninth Symphony, to name two examples) or of grandeur past description (the end of the Second and Eighth Symphonies), and everything in between, Mahler could really write for the orchestra like no one else. His mastery of orchestral sonority and unique colors is always evident.

3) Respighi
Much like Ravel, there's a certain clarity in his orchestration that few have equaled. And he really knew how to score a climax! Just listen to the end of Church Windows, Feste Romane, and (of course) Pines of Rome. Wow!

4) Bax
There's this irresistible exoticism (for lack of a better word) in Bax's orchestration that keeps me fascinated and engaged. He has his own magical, mystical sound world (English horn, bass clarinet, muted trombones, violas) that recurs in a lot of his orchestral music. There's no one quite like him.

5) Rachmaninov
I feel like Rachmaninov doesn't get enough love as an orchestrator. I love the sound of his dark, burnished, quintessentially Russian orchestra! And those 'big tunes' have great orchestration to back them up - it's more than just 'give it to the violins'.

So who are your favorite orchestrators? Who has that fabulous knack for orchestral color, that creative use of instrumental timbres, that keeps you coming back?

[j winter]

*pokes head above foxhole*

Leopold Stokowski

*dives back into foxhole*

[Florestan]

Haydn
Mozart
Rossini
Mendelssohn
Rimsky-Korsakov

[Jo498]

I am not that fond of late romantic/early modern orchestration wizardry although I like some of the pieces like Strauss' Don Juan or Ravel's La valse (not so much Respighi and Rachmaninoff)

My "ideal" orchestral sound is much more early romantic/late classical, roughly Beethoven/Weber/Mendelssohn, i.e. full woodwind and basic brass but no extras like cor anglais or additional brass, percussion, harp etc. Berlioz is already often a bit too extravagant. (And Schubert's Great C major a bit too rough and brassy, it's good but not a favorite as far as sheer sound goes) In a way I miss my ideal early romantic symphony/orchestral piece. The closest are Mendelssohn's "Scottish" as well as his and Weber's famous ouvertures.

Mahler - atmospheric without appearing gimmicky to me, i.e. the sounds don't draw attention to themselves as sounds*
Tchaikovsky - can be a bit too flashy at times but one just has to marvel at bonbons like the ones from the nutcracker suite
Wagner - also incredible setting of moods and meanings
Weber - invented the romantic sound, mostly with Freischütz
Mozart - that's pre-romantic and a different aesthetic but the woodwinds in the piano concertos or basically letting clarinets, bassoons, horns "color" a whole piece like the symphony #39 is extraordinary

*edit: I am a bit unfair here, probably because I overall like Mahler much more than most of the "Orchestral spectacular" stuff. When I heard the beginning of his 9th for the first time I found the stopped horn sounds ugly and irritating (so they certainly drew attention...)

[Todd]

Wagner
Debussy
Berlioz
Mahler
Puccini

[Symphonic Addict]

Since some of my favorites have been mentioned already, I'll mention other great ones:

Prokofiev
Bantock
Szymanowski
Korngold
Martinu

[Lisztianwagner]

Mine could be:

Wagner
Mahler
Ravel
Respighi
R. Strauss

[Symphonic Addict]

Recently I've come to think of Lutoslawski as a very striking orchestrator. The way he handled textures, timbres, sonorities, shows his abilities to explode the orchestral palette.

[Symphonic Addict]

This composer definitely deserves a mention: Gustav Holst.

[DavidW]

This composer definitely deserves a mention: Gustav Holst.

Thanks to @Ian I've been exploring his non-Planets works.  They are surprisingly good.

[Symphonic Addict]

Thanks to @Ian I've been exploring his non-Planets works.  They are surprisingly good.

Yes, and something that has made him even more special is that he didn't write much in any standard musical form by following any templates.

[Cato]

For your consideration:

Bernard Herrmann.


I am thinking of things like the scores for On Dangerous Ground (Viola d'Amore and a large brass section), the ten flutes in the rejected score for Torn Curtain, and the scores for the fantasy movies e.g. The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad and Jason and the Argonauts.

[relm1]

Ravel
Herb Spencer
Holst (specifically the Planets)
Lutoslawski
Richard Strauss

[Uhor]

I agree with most of the above, difficult to choose five, so I will just menation the highly original Grainger.

[Le Buisson Ardent]

Here would be my five favorite orchestrators (in no particular order):

Mahler
Strauss
Berlioz
Schoenberg
Ravel

Too bad I'm limited to only five as there are so many other incredible orchestrators that deserve mention.

[Karl Henning]

Stravinsky
Ravel
Prokofiev
Schoenberg
The fifth is a toss-up between Bartók & Martinů

[brewski]

I was listening to Ravel's Daphnis et Chloé last night (in Seiji Ozawa's wonderful performance), with the score courtesy of IMSLP, and the orchestration just left me speechless. Ravel's gift for orchestral color is pretty well unmatched - how is it that even in his busiest passages, you can hear "right through" the music? That he maintains that wonderful sense of clarity?

Though for now I'll hold off choosing five, I wanted to chime in about Daphnis, since I just heard it twice this week with Esa-Pekka Salonen, the Philadelphia Symphonic Choir (75 voices!), and The Philadelphia Orchestra. When the glow of these has subsided, I'll certainly revisit with the score (which a friend gifted to me last year, after clearing out his apartment).

It really is a marvel of orchestration. Such colors! Every page has unusual timbres created by unorthodox combinations of instruments, and then you get special effects like the wind machine. And yes, the clarity is something else. (Of course, I'm assuming Ozawa had something to do with this particular recording — which sounds like a good one.)

So adding my "Ravel" vote, with four more to come later.

-Bruce

[atardecer]

Ravel, Stravinsky and Takemitsu sound top-tier to my ears.

I'm tempted to add Prokofiev and Bartók, and they are great but I think I'm being influenced by my love of their music. I can't say I think their orchestration sounds objectively any better than say Wagner or Shostakovich.

[classicalgeek]

Here would be my five favorite orchestrators (in no particular order):

Mahler
Strauss
Berlioz
Schoenberg
Ravel

Too bad I'm limited to only five as there are so many other incredible orchestrators that deserve mention.

Including Koechlin! He has such a creative approach to using the orchestra, including plenty of unusual instruments. There's no one who orchestrates quite like him.

Though for now I'll hold off choosing five, I wanted to chime in about Daphnis, since I just heard it twice this week with Esa-Pekka Salonen, the Philadelphia Symphonic Choir (75 voices!), and The Philadelphia Orchestra. When the glow of these has subsided, I'll certainly revisit with the score (which a friend gifted to me last year, after clearing out his apartment).

It really is a marvel of orchestration. Such colors! Every page has unusual timbres created by unorthodox combinations of instruments, and then you get special effects like the wind machine. And yes, the clarity is something else. (Of course, I'm assuming Ozawa had something to do with this particular recording — which sounds like a good one.)

So adding my "Ravel" vote, with four more to come later.

-Bruce

It's quite a mesmerizing score, isn't it?   How wonderful that you got to hear it in concert! I actually got to hear it in concert as well - with the Oberlin Orchestra when I was a student 30 years ago. They did a fine job, but nowhere hear the quality of a professional orchestra, and they omitted the choir as well - it's just not the same without it!

[Le Buisson Ardent]

Including Koechlin! He has such a creative approach to using the orchestra, including plenty of unusual instruments. There's no one who orchestrates quite like him.

Absolutely. I could've thrown in dozens of other names, but, as I mentioned, five is far too limiting.