A Bassoon quintet is a piece of chamber music for bassoon and four other instruments, normally a string quartet.
Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers, with one performer to a part. However, by convention, it usually does not include solo instrument performances.
The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor clefs, and occasionally the treble. Appearing in its modern form in the 19th century, the bassoon figures prominently in orchestral, concert band, and chamber music literature. The bassoon is a non-transposing instrument known for its distinctive tone colour, wide range, variety of character and agility. Someone who plays the bassoon is called a bassoonist.
A string quartet is a musical ensemble consisting of four string players – two violin players, a viola player and a cellist – or a piece written to be performed by such a group. The string quartet is one of the most prominent chamber ensembles in classical music, with most major composers, from the mid 18th century onwards, writing string quartets.
Quintets for bassoon and string quartet include the Quintet by Graham Waterhouse, [1] compositions by Gordon Jacob and Franz Danzi, and works by Anton Reicha, including his Bassoon quintet and his Variations for bassoon and string quartet . [2]
The Bassoon Quintet is a quintet by Graham Waterhouse, composed in 2003 for bassoon and string quartet.
Graham Waterhouse is an English composer and cellist. For his own instrument, he composed a cello concerto and Three Pieces for Solo Cello. He has written string quartets and compositions which juxtapose a quartet with a solo instrument, including Piccolo Quintet, Bassoon Quintet and Rhapsodie Macabre. He has set poetry for speaking voice and cello, such as Der Handschuh, and has composed song cycles. His compositions reflect the individual capacity and character of players and instruments, from piccolo to contrabassoon.
Gordon Percival Septimus Jacob CBE was an English composer and teacher. He was a professor at the Royal College of Music in London from 1924 until his retirement in 1966, and published four books and many articles about music. As a composer he was prolific: the list of his works totals more than 700, mostly compositions of his own, but a substantial minority of orchestrations and arrangements of other composers' works. Those whose music he orchestrated range from William Byrd to Edward Elgar to Noël Coward.
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Franz Ignaz Danzi was a German cellist, composer and conductor, the son of the noted Italian cellist Innocenz Danzi (1730–98). Born in Schwetzingen, Franz Danzi worked in Mannheim, Munich, Stuttgart and Karlsruhe, where he died.
A piano sextet is a composition for piano and five other musical instruments, or a group of six musicians who perform such works. There is no standard grouping of instruments with that name, and compared to the string quartet or piano quintet literature, relatively few such compositions exist. The best-known piano sextet is probably the Sextet by Poulenc, one of the pinnacles of the wind and piano repertoire. Chausson's Concert is widely regarded as one of the masterpieces of French strings and piano chamber music literature.
A wind quintet, also known as a woodwind quintet, is a group of five wind players. Some quintets alternatively use an English horn instead of a French horn. The term also applies to a composition for such a group.
Anton Reicha (Rejcha) was a Czech-born, later naturalized French composer. A contemporary and lifelong friend of Beethoven, he is now best remembered for his substantial early contributions to the wind quintet literature and his role as teacher of pupils including Franz Liszt, Hector Berlioz and César Franck. He was also an accomplished theorist, and wrote several treatises on various aspects of composition. Some of his theoretical work dealt with experimental methods of composition, which he applied in a variety of works such as fugues and études for piano and string quartet.
A flute quartet is a musical term for a type of chamber music group. They are normally found in two forms: those consisting of a flute, a violin, a viola and a cello; and those consisting of four flutes. This last combination can come in multiple different but distinct arrangements:
William Waterhouse was a distinguished English bassoonist and musicologist. He played with notable orchestras, was a member of the Melos Ensemble, professor at the Royal Northern College of Music, author of the Yehudi Menuhin Music Guide "Bassoon", of The New Langwill Index, and contributor to the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.
The Melos Ensemble is a group of musicians who started in 1950 in London to play chamber music in mixed instrumentation of string instruments, wind instruments and others. The ensemble's reputation for excellence has encouraged composers to write music exploring these resources. Benjamin Britten composed the chamber music for his War Requiem for the Melos Ensemble and conducted the group in the first performance in Coventry.
Piccolo Quintet is short for the Quintet op. 26 of Graham Waterhouse, composed in 1989 for piccolo and string quartet and published by Zimmermann in 2002 as Quintet for piccolo, 2 violins, viola and violoncello.
Ivor McMahon (1924–1972) was an English violinist. He played with notable orchestras including the Philharmonia Orchestra and the English Chamber Orchestra and is best known for playing second violin in the Melos Ensemble.
Lyndon Jeffrey Frank Watts is an Australian bassoonist. He is principal bassoonist of the Münchner Philharmoniker and an academic teacher.
In music, a duodecet—sometimes duodectet, or duodecimette—is a composition which requires twelve musicians for a performance, or a musical group that consists of twelve people. In jazz, such a group of twelve players is sometimes called a "twelvetet". The corresponding German word is duodezett. The French equivalent form, douzetuor, is virtually unknown. Unlike some other musical ensembles such as the string quartet, there is no established or standard set of instruments in a duodecet.
Epitaphium is a composition for string trio by Graham Waterhouse. In 2007, after the death of his father William Waterhouse, he composed Epitaphium in Memoriam W.R.W. as a tribute to his memory.
Jörg Duda is a German composer of classical music.
Victor Bruns was a German composer and bassoonist. He played with the Leningrad Opera, the Volksoper Berlin and the Staatskapelle Berlin. As a composer, he is known for his ballets and for bassoon concertos and sonatas.
Graham Waterhouse, cellist and composer especially of chamber music, has written a number of works for string quartet, three major works in several movements, several smaller works and compositions for a solo instrument and string quartet.
Chieftain's Salute is a concerto in one movement for Great Highland Bagpipe and orchestra by Graham Waterhouse. The work is one of few to use the bagpipe with a classical orchestra. A version for bagpipe and string orchestra, Op. 34a, was composed in 2001. It is based on an earlier work for bagpipe and string quartet. Jacobean Salute was also derived from the early work, with a wind quintet replacing the bagpipe, published in 2003. A version for bagpipe and orchestra was composed and first performed in 2015.
Phoenix Arising is a composition for bassoon and piano by Graham Waterhouse, who wrote it in 2008 in memory of his father, the bassoonist and musicologist William Waterhouse. It premiered in London in 2009, and was published by Accolade the same year.