Die schweigsame Frau – Richard Strauss
Transcriptions for Wind Band,

Die schweigsame Frau – Richard Strauss

‘Die schweigsame Frau’ (The Silent Woman), is an opera in three acts by Richard Strauss to a libretto by Stefan Zweig. Strauss gave the overture the subtitle ‘potpourri’. The term denotes a medley of popular nineteenth-century melodies, ones that brass and coffee-house bands would have typically performed in Strauss’s day. Nevertheless, Strauss’s overture has little in common really with these; his motifs are brief fragments of melodies, and are often juxtaposed in a masterfully elaborated polyphonic fabric.

Publisher: → Baton Music

explanation text: © Baton Music

Der Bürger als Edelmann – Richard Strauss
Transcriptions for Wind Band,

Der Bürger als Edelmann – Richard Strauss

‘Der Bürger als Edelmann’ is the German title of a play by Molière and an orchestral suite by Richard Strauss. The original French play is called ‘Le bourgeois gentilhomme’ and is about a wealthy merchant who would like to become a nobleman. The play was first performed in 1670 with music by Jean-Baptiste Lully. Strauss composed his orchestral suite in 1919 based on the music he had written between 1911 and 1917 for an adaptation of the piece by Hugo von Hofmannsthal. The suite consists of nine movements in which Strauss used some of Lully’s themes, but gave them his own romantic twist. 

Publisher: → Baton Music

explanation text: © Baton Music

Also sprach Zarathustra – Richard Strauss
Transcriptions for Wind Band,

Also sprach Zarathustra – Richard Strauss

‘Also sprach Zarathustra!’, (‘Thus Spoke Zarathustra’) is a tone poem by Richard Strauss, composed in 1896 and inspired by Friedrich Nietzsche’s philosophical novel ‘Thus Spoke Zarathustra!’. The composer conducted its first performance on 27 November 1896 in Frankfurt.

The piece is divided into nine sections played with only three definite pauses. Strauss named the sections after selected chapters of Nietzsche’s novel highlighting  major moments of the character Zarathustra’s philosophical journey in the novel. The general storylines and ideas in these chapters were the inspiration used to build the tone poem’s structure.


The initial fanfare (‘Sunrise’) became well known after its use in Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 film ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’  and was also often used as a portent of a significant event to come or regularly used for space-related scenes.

Publisher: → Baton Music

explanation text: © Baton Music

Symphonie pour Orgue et Orchestre – Charles Widor
Transcriptions for Wind Band,

Symphonie pour Orgue et Orchestre – Charles Widor

Charles Widor

Born in 1844, he soon became involved in organ music from home. He received organ lessons from his father and did so well that he was allowed to replace him when he was eleven years old. In 1863, on the advice of the French organ builder Aristide Cavaillé-Coll, he moved to Brussels to study with Jacques- Nicolas Lemmens.

In 1870 he moved to Paris to become organist for 64 years at Saint-Sulpice, where the organ builder Cavaillé-Coll had placed his largest instrument. With one of the top organs to himself, he thought it was time to write a ‘new’ kind of organ music, the so-called organ symphony.

With his 10 symphonies he pushed both the organist and the organ to extremes. He was also a good pedagogue, passing on his knowledge as teacher of organ and composition at the Conservatoire de Paris.

Symphonie pour Orgue et Orchestre

In 1880, the future king of England, Edward VII, requested that Widor compose a grand work for organ and orchestra to be performed in London’s Royal Albert Hall.

Using movements from his second and sixth symphonies for solo organ as the basis, Widor created a masterpiece that launched a renaissance in the organ/ orchestra combination, a legendary tour de force to the repertory for organ and orchestra.

This transcription was commissioned by Wind Orchestra Auletes Eindhoven (NL).

Konzert für 2 Klarinetten – Franz Anton Hoffmeister
Transcriptions for Wind Band,

Konzert für 2 Klarinetten – Franz Anton Hoffmeister

InstrumentationWind Band
Grade4
Duration10 minutes
PublisherJanssen Music
Demo Score→ Download

Franz Anton Hoffmeister was born in Rottenburg am Neckar on 12 May 1754. At the age of fourteen he went to Vienna to study law. Following his studies, however, he decided on a career in music and by the 1780s he had become one of the city’s most popular composers, with an extensive and varied catalogue of works to his credit.

Hoffmeister’s reputation today rests mainly on his activities as a music publisher. By 1785 he had established one of Vienna’s first music publishing businesses.

Hoffmeister published his own works as well as those of many important composers of the time, including Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and many others.

This transcription of the 1st movement of “Konzert für 2 Klarinetten” for (small) wind band gives soloists a great opportunity to showcase themselves in this beautiful work.

Der Rosenkavalier (Walzerfolge No. 2) – Richard Strauss
Transcriptions for Wind Band,

Der Rosenkavalier (Walzerfolge No. 2) – Richard Strauss

‘Der Rosenkavalier’, Op. 59, is a comic opera in three acts by Richard Strauss to an original German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal. It was first performed at the ‘Königliches Opernhaus’ in Dresden on 26 January 1911 and the opera became immediate and profound popular.

As one would expect of a commercial hit, the music was pressed into all manner of use through arrangements and transcriptions. Strauss produced the earliest orchestral extract himself  in 1911, directly on the heels of the premiere; he titled it ‘Walzerfolge Rosenkavalier 3. Akt’ (‘Waltz Sequence from Rosenkavalier Act 3’) which in the end was entitled as ‘Walzerfolge No. 2’ (‘Waltz Sequence No. 2’).

Publisher: → Baton Music

explanation text © Baton Music

Rhapsody on a theme by Paganini – Rachmaninov
Transcriptions for Wind Band,

Rhapsody on a theme by Paganini – Rachmaninov

InstrumentationPiano & Wind Band
Grade5
Duration30 minutes
Publisher→ Baton Music

In the summer of 1934 Rachmaninoff composed the ‘Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini’ at his summer home, the Villa Senar in Switzerland.

It’s a concertante work written by for piano and orchestra, closely resembling a piano concerto in a single movement.

After a brief introduction, the first variation is played before the well known ‘Paganini theme’ and then followed by the other 23 variations.

The work is performed in one stretch without breaks but it can be divided into three sections. These correspond to the three movements of a concerto: up to variation 10 corresponds to the first movement, variations 11 to 18 are the equivalent of a slow movement, and the remaining variations make a finale.

text: © baton music

Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 – Franz Liszt
Transcriptions for Wind Band,

Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 – Franz Liszt

InstrumentationWind Band
Grade5
Duration12 minutes
Publisher→ Baton Music

The Hungarian-born composer and pianist Franz Liszt was strongly influenced by the music heard in his youth, particularly Hungarian folk music, with its unique gypsy scale, rhythmic spontaneity and direct, seductive expression.


‘Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2’, is the second in a set of 19 Hungarian rhapsodies Liszt composed but it is by far the most famous of the set. It was dedicated to Count László Teleki and first published as a piano solo in 1851.

Its immediate success and popularity on the concert stage led to an orchestrated version, arranged in 1857–1860 by the composer in collaboration with Franz Doppler.

For this transcription I used as well the Doppler version as the version by Müller-Berghaus.

© text: Baton Music