Shosty Piano Noms Turned Brass

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There are so many great pieces of music out there written for brass chamber ensembles.  There is also a good amount of music that is not written for brass but instead are originally written for piano and are arranged for brass.  Recently, our class had our first student listening presentation.  The list of music presented included Shostakovich's Four Preludes Op. 34 numbers 6 and 14.  These were great to listen to!  Many may argue that a lot of transcriptions don't fit well for the brass ensemble.  Some literature, like Shostakovich's Four Preludes Op. 34 are great for the brass ensemble. 
The piano is a beautiful instrument all on its own, but I believe that it does have certain limitations on how far it can reach expression.  Don’t get me wrong though, I truly do love music written for piano and enjoy listening to it.  These preludes that were arranged for brass and percussion bring out so many different colors that stood out to me.  The timbres of each instrument combined bring out a very nice sound that attract my ear personally.  It’s a bit hard for the piano to reach the dynamic volumes and colors that a combination of brass instruments can do.  Personally, the intense dynamic changes reach me emotionally, listening to the recording of Summit Brass perform Shostakovich was revealing me to that fact.  Having different brass instruments also helps with character distinction.  On the piano, you press a key and a hammer hits the strings and sounds are created, but the different articulations that brass players are able to create bring out a variety of characters, and they were very fitting within these preludes.


Whenever you get the chance you should listen to both the piano version and brass ensemble version!  Both are great! J


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