I am eternally grateful towards people making resources available on the web, and I am no less grateful towards those helping me finding these resources.
I have read the overture and the second act, because the score tells me a whole lot about period scoring practises in Italy. I did not find the odd notation mentioned by Hans. It still may be there in the score, but I rather suspect an error by the guy, who engraved the parts. Bellini has been said to score lightly. Bizet has been said to try to re-orchestrate Norma for a fatter version, but he gave up upon that project. So I was somewhat surprised, when I found an ff opening chord with 3 trombones and a cimbasso. The Italians must have had instruments with 3 valves in 1831, as the 1st trumpet in D has a prominent written Ab in the overture. What I have seen from the horn parts could be done with advanced hand horn techniques, but the transpositions are all over the place with fast changes, so I, like Hans, assume valve horns. Everything could be done on a single F with 3 valves. Hans also is right about the light playing. From my other brass areas I know, that the Italians used very small bore instruments. In the 2nd act Bellini comes up with a quartet of the clarinets and the 1st pair of horns. "Norma"-lly one would expect the clarinets taking the 2 top parts, but Bellini juxtaposes the instruments in a way, which will kill the important 2nd clarinet harmony notes, if the first horn does not play with the outmost discretion. If I were asked to play any of the horn parts of this opera (which will not happen, even if they are not really difficult from a technical point of view), then I rather would bring my 5 valve small bell single Bb Hoyer rather than my Conn 28D double. I could go on ranting about instrumentation issues of this score, but I would go beyond horn relevancy. Klaus Smedegaard Bjerre --- William Melton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Is there any edition of the "Norma"-score available on the > > web? I have problems reading off paper, but I have some well > > lit large computer screens. > > Klaus, try http://www.dlib.indiana.edu/variations/scores/bah4585/ > large/index.html > > For those who don't know this resource, the friendly library sprites > at Indiana U. have given us quite a few opera and symphonic full > scores, all scrollable online. Highlights include Strauss' "Ariadne," > Wagner's "Lohengrin," "Tristan" and "Parsifal," " Weber's > "Freischuetz," seven Bruckner symphonies, Beethoven, Brahms and quite > a bit more that's horn oriented (as well as plenty of other good music). > > Afterwards I recommend a stop at UC Santa Barbara's http:// > cylinders.library.ucsb.edu/ > Bill Melton > Hauset (B) / Sinfonie Orchester Aachen (D __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ post: horn@music.memphis.edu unsubscribe or set options at http://music2.memphis.edu/mailman/options/horn/archive%40jab.org
