Country Gardens (arr Clark)

From Wind Repertory Project
Percy Aldridge Grainger

Percy Aldridge Grainger (arr. Tom Clark)


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General Info

Year: 1918 / 1931
Duration: c. 2:10
Difficulty: IV (see Ratings for explanation)
Original Medium: Piano
Publisher: G. Schirmer
Cost: Score and Parts (print) - $60.00   |   Score Only (print) - $5.00

For additional availability information, see Discussion tab, above.


Instrumentation

Condensed Score
D-flat Piccolo
Flute I-II
Oboe I-II
Bassoon I-II
B-flat Soprano Clarinet Solo-II-III
E-flat Alto Clarinet
B-flat Bass Clarinet
B-flat Soprano Saxophone
E-flat Alto Saxophone Solo-I
B-flat Tenor Saxophone
E-flat Baritone Saxophone
B-flat Bass Saxophone
B-flat Cornet Solo-II
B-flat Trumpet I-II
Flugelhorn
E-flat Horn or Alto I-II-III-IV
Horn in F I-II-III-IV
Trombone I-II-III
Euphonium
Tuba
Harp
Piano
Celesta
Timpani
Percussion I-II (5 players), including:

  • Glockenspiel
  • Marimba
  • Snare Drum
  • Vibraphone
  • Wood Block


Errata

None discovered thus far.


Program Notes

Country Gardens is an English folk tune that Cecil Sharp collected in 1908 and passed on to Grainger, who played improvisations on it during his World War I tour as a concert pianist for the U.S. Army. According to Grainger, it is a dance version of the tune The Vicar of Bray. Once published in its original piano form, the tune brought Grainger great success. However, it was not among his favorite compositions. Later in life, despite the steady stream of income from its royalties, the fame of Country Gardens and the widespread public association of this work as being his best known piece, the work came to haunt Grainger. Mentally, it became his albatross. He came to think of his own brilliant original music as “my wretched tone art.” He once remarked, “The typical English country garden is not often used to grow flowers in; it is more likely to be a vegetable plot. So you can think of turnips as I play it.”

When asked in 1950 by Leopold Stokowski to make a new arrangement for Stokowski’s orchestra, Grainger obliged with a wildly satirical version that literally sticks out its tongue at the success of the little tune. In 1953, he rescored that arrangement for band. Reflecting his mood at the time, it is a bitingly sophisticated parody that was to become his only band setting of the music.

- Program Note from SUNY Fredonia Wind Symphony concert program, 27 September 2017


The charismatic, quirky, brilliant character of Percy Grainger is not likely to be recreated. A genius by any measure, Grainger was a piano virtuoso, a major force in the collection and preservation of folk songs, and a visionary composer of considerable gifts.

In 1918, Grainger wrote to Cecil Sharp about a new folk song setting he had prepared. During one of his Liberty Loan concerts, Percy had improvised on one of Sharp’s Morris dance tunes called Country Gardens - a Handkerchief Dance. Percy’s version of Country Gardens proved so popular that he decided to commit it to paper, and presented it as a birthday gift to his mother in 1918. As with his other folk song settings, it was “lovingly and reverently dedicated to the memory of Edvard Grieg.”

John Philip Sousa admired Grainger’s compositions and programmed them regularly. Sousa knew a good tune when he heard it, and decided to arrange and feature Country Gardens in concerts with his own band.

- Program Note from the Cedar Park Winds Community Band concert program, 20 December 2017


Media


State Ratings

  • Indiana: ISSMA SENIOR BAND GROUP II
  • Iowa: IV
  • Kansas: IV
  • Louisiana: IV
  • Maryland: V
  • Mississippi: VI-A
  • Oklahoma: IV-A
  • Tennessee: IV


Performances

To submit a performance please join The Wind Repertory Project

  • University of Georgia (Athens) Hodgson Concert Band (Andrew Blair, conductor) - 18 March 2022
  • University of North Texas (Denton) Concert Band (Slade Denman, conductor) - 16 April 2021
  • Central Michigan University (Mount Pleasant) Wind Symphony (James Batcheller, conductor) – 18 April 2019
  • University of North Texas (Denton) Wind Ensemble (Jochen McEvoy, conductor) – 9 October 2018


Works for Winds by This Composer

Adaptable Music


All Wind Works


Resources

  • Country Gardens, Wikipedia Accessed 9 October 2018
  • Grainger, P.; Clark, T. (1931). Country Gardens [score]. G. Schirmer, Inc.: [s.l.].
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