I should say a few words about this year’s Nutcrackers, as I always do. But it seems like almost every time I blog about it, someone somewhere asks me to take the post down. I am hoping that people think this post is very benign, and they don’t make me take the post down again!
This year I’m not playing too many Nutcrackers. I’m just playing enough to help my colleagues out. I have a bunch of practicing I want to be doing and if I do a lot of Nutcrackers, I have no chops left to do anything constructive at home. It’s a very taxing work for horn, especially when you play multiple shows on a high part of a reduced arrangement. So I’m taking it easy this year.
This year we’re doing a new arrangement of it by someone named Joseph Ceo. I haven’t been able to find anything online about who Ceo is; when doing a Google search on him, I kept on getting hits for Chief Executive Officers who are on the boards of ballet companies. But it is a pretty decent arrangement, definitely better than the Itkin arrangement we did last year. It’s as if Mr./Ms. Ceo actually asked a horn player his opinion on what is possible on the instrument. A few of the solos would have been more appropriately arranged for 2nd horn, and vice versa, so we ended up swapping some licks with the 2nd horn. I still have to leave out a few notes here and there, or swap octaves with the 2nd horn to make it playable, just as with the other arrangement. But other than that, the Ceo arrangement is very well done.
Of course, I do miss the original Nutcracker. Back when we used to do the original and unadulterated work, I never realized how spoiled I was to play an original 1st or 3rd horn part (those were also the days when we did multiple performances of Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet- ah, nostalgia!). The brass harmonies are so full in the complete orchestration, with 4 horns, a complete trombone section, and a tuba. But I think those days have passed for my orchestra. Nutcracker is really wonderful music and I hope to again play the original, as the composer intended, someday. But original or not, to me it never seems like the holidays without Nutcracker.
Hi Julia,
I tried searching for “Joseph Ceo” (in quotes) and then Nutcracker. I haven’t looked at all the results, but I did come up with this newspaper article (http://www.timesleaderonline.com/page/content.detail/id/514346/The-Nutcracker.html). This mentions that he is a native of Wheeling, Ohio. There might be more stuff about him on other pages. I always enjoy your blog – sorry some people try to censor your Nutcracker posts!
Thanks Jeff! I think Wheeling’s actually in West Virginia, not Ohio.
For inquiring minds, a friend sent me the following link about Joseph Ceo:
http://www.musicadolce.org/MusicaDolce/Joe_Ceo.html
Yikes, my bad. If I had stopped to remember grade school geography, I might have caught that. The paper bills itself as the voice of Eastern Ohio, which I hereby blame for my mistake!
WHY in the heck would someone want you to take down a post about the Nutcracker? You don’t strike me as someone who would write something offensive!
I just finished a week of playing the Nutcracker with the Sacramento Ballet, using the William McDurmott reduced orchestration. Are any of you familiar with that one? About half of it seems to be original, but some woodwind chordal passages have been added.
The opening scene with those famously treacherous octaves are made doubly “interesting” by compressing them into only two parts. I’m always SO relieved to be done with those!
Waltz of the Flowers just ain’t the same with only 2 horns, supplemented by bassoons.
Over the years, the regular Principal horn has marked a great deal of brackets for both 1st & 2nd horns to give necessary rest, and they work very well. Still, there is no getting around the taxing Pas de Deux, even with rests!
I played a couple shows on 1st and four shows on 2nd, using a single B-flat 3-valve Sansone horn. It worked very well in that setting.
Actually I wrote some of my opinion of some of the political issues involved, and I completely understand why I was asked to take them down. But I have had to take down 3 posts in the last 2 years regarding it (over half of what I’ve written), and I’m getting really tired of it. I guess I have learn to clam up about certain issues.
As for the McDurmott arrangement, I don’t know it. And I don’t want to!
I think the Ceo arrangement of the Waltz of the Flowers is 2 horns, trombone, and 2nd trumpet! Yes, it’s not the same…
Be careful what you ask for. A high school friend of mine, who is now Dr. Violin Professor and concert master of the orchestra, posted on Facebook that he had just completed Nutcracker # 320. And the fellas in the pit here at the Houston Ballet have that 1000 yard stare that they get this time every year.
I’m not sure of my exact Nutcracker number, but I believe I’m about to hit 200, if I haven’t already.