# Arranging for brass quintet



## bluejay (Oct 29, 2007)

Does anyone have any advice/links/book recommendations to learn about arranging for brass quintet?

Thanks in advance.


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## VonRichter (Oct 29, 2007)

I've written 3 meaty pieces for brass quintet over the years. All of which have received one or more performances and/or readings. It's one of my favorite chamber groupings. It's quite easy to score for, assuming knowledge of brass instruments. It's also loud which is always a good thing 

It lets the instruments shine like they rarely can in an orchestra, because the constant playing keeps the instruments/players warmed up, so the players rarely crack notes from the tension, and you can be a little more dangerous with "unprepared" high notes and such once the piece is in motion. Of course this depends on the skill of the players, but it's not hard to assemble 5 good brass players.

Let me know if you need any specific help.

*A couple random ideas based on my own subjective scoring methods.*

*Unlike in an orchestral situation, where you have the 2-horns for every trumpet or trombone rule, you can get away with a single horn on a note in an loud tutti, due to the sparseness of texture. Be more careful if the horn has the tune over a tutti backing.

*Don't overlook doublings. Two trumpets for example, is more "rich" than a single trumpet, and it's doesn't have to be louder necessarily.

*Depending on the nature of the writing, there are a couple "faux orchestra" doublings that I use. In particular:

Horn + trombone (trombone marked a degree lower than the horn) = faux horn unison.

Horn + high tuba = faux horn unison. (can be extremely convincing).

Usually in these cases, the trumpets supply the sustained harmony, or "string section" filigree etc.


*Avoid over-use of the trumpets on the melody.

*Give the tuba solos.

*Tubas are very agile instruments despite their size. Their main limitation is the need for many breaths. 

*Tutti staccatos sound fantastic with brass quintet.

*The trombone is plenty agile in it's middle and upper registers, especially at or below mf. Despite moronic textbooks to the contrary, you can assign it flowing arpeggios and melodies, and they sound absolutely wonderful.

*Mutes! Hard to find places for putting them on in a quintet, but worth it. In particular, the muted trumpets give you two free oboes! It's wise in such cases to write something to the effect of "faux oboe" "ersatz oboe" "pseudo oboe" in the score and parts, just to make sure the players know what you're going for.


Hope those ideas help.

Be careful with some of these ideas, as they require careful usage are are not "standards".


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## bluejay (Oct 30, 2007)

VR, thank you very much for this!

Once I get further into the project I'll ask more specific questions.


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## Patrick de Caumette (Oct 30, 2007)

Bluejay, I am not aware of books specifically dealing with brass quintet only but can recommend two orchestration books:
Samuel Adler: "The study of orchestration" and Alfred Blatter: "Instrumentation and orchestration"
They both deal with all families of the orchestra, including brass writing, and are excellent references...


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