... instrument's weight, and the size of its mouthpiece, call for a player of exceptional stamina - and a lot of patience, too, since the tuba is given very few of the best tunes! PERCUSSION Percussion instruments form a big and highly diverse family. They range from a simple block of wood or metal which is struck, to the piano - played in a percussive rather than a melodic way - and the ... Spake Zarathustra (used in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey) has one of the most exciting organ entries in the musical repertoire. TAMBOURINE One of the percussion section featured in Britten's Young Pers...

• Word Count: 2483
• Approx Pages: 10
• Grade Level: High School

... became rather less exciting. Trumpets and horns though were completely accepted as a vital part of the orchestral sound in the later works of the Classical era. Apart from the timpani, percussion instruments were used as novelties. They were too closely associated with military bands as being too strong for the opera audience. There were ... piccolo and the cor anglais. While Classical composers had used pairs of brass and woodwind instruments, Wagner often called for triple or quadruple woodwind or just expanded at will. The new instruments and bigger orchestras made it possible for co...

• Word Count: 1812
• Approx Pages: 7

... the length of the instrument to be changed while playing. This occurred around the middle to late 19th century. Consequently, the brass instruments are less prominent in the music of Bach, Mozart and Beethoven along with their contemporaries. The qualities that define the works of Mozart ... to say the least. Late 19th and early 20th century composers make use of a very large orchestra with all the fully developed wind instruments. Some of the master orchestrators/composers of this time were Wagner, Rimskey-Korsakov, Ravel and Stravinsky. Currently, composers also make use of ... the f...

• Word Count: 2090
• Approx Pages: 8
• Has Bibliography

... . Flutes, oboes, clarinets, and bassoons added color and strength to the strings. At the mid range, brass instruments were added. Their use was somewhat limited, with French horns and trumpets generally appearing only at candances. In the Viennese orchestra timpani was the only percussion instrument and its use was very scarce. Mozart's Violin Concerto in G Major does not consist of the standard ... ...

• Word Count: 2650
• Approx Pages: 11
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: High School