Klarinet Archive - Posting 000820.txt from 2002/03

From: Daniel Leeson <leeson0@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Woodwinds in Toscanini orchestra
Date: Fri, 29 Mar 2002 08:59:25 -0500

During the thirties, fourties, and to some extent the 1950s, the
prevailing idea of the classic and early romantic orchestral literature
was that it was improperly scored, particularly Mozart, Beethoven, and
Schubert. And so both conductors and musicians (particularly musicians)
made a concerted effort to fix what they perceived was a problem caused
by the composers failing to realize the acoustics of an orchestra.

Doubled winds was commonplace but not the only change. I remember be at
a performance of the NY Philharmonic in the 1940s in which the
orchestral compliment of 8 basses was increased to 12 for Beethoven 9.

The era of the BIG orchestra was in full flower at that time, I suppose
under the impression that the bigger the better. The other factor was
driving by the fact that orchestral string sections were getting bigger
and bigger. 16 1st violins was absolutely commonplace, and I suppose
that some conductors felt the need to double the winds to balance such
an overpowering string section.

The musicians loved it because there was lots of extra work.

Dan

Jim Hobby wrote:
>
> I've recently watched the BMG recordings of the Toscanini concerts, and
> noticed again that he seems to have beefed up the woodwind sections. In all
> of them that I've watched through (except the Mozart Symphony 40), he's
> carrying 4 flutes, 4 oboes, 3 bassoons, 1 contrabassoon, and 4 clarinets.
> On the solo sections, the principal instruments only play. On the tutti,
> the whole bunch chime in. (The first I noticed was the Brahms I, and I did
> a quick check, but was unable to find my copy of the score. (Dover)) In the
> brass, he seems to shortcut in several places. Brahms I had two trumpets &
> two trombones. (And 4 horns.) Aida, of course, had more brass. The
> Mozart was the basic 2:2:2:2 in woodwinds.
>
> Does anyone know the reasoning behind this? The accoustics in Studio 8H
> appear, from the recordings, to be very brittle. The Carnegie Hall
> accoustics seem a lot more "concert-hall-like", but he still has the large
> ww section. In several of the performances, it seems he has a quite large
> string section, compared to a lot of current day orchestras. At one point,
> I think 20 1sts and 18 2nds.
>
> Aside from the possibility that I'm not seeing everything in these rather
> poor (video) quality recordings, does anyone recall a reason behind this?
>
> Thanks. Jim Hobby
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------

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** Dan Leeson **
** leeson0@-----.net **
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