Olympic Dances
General Info
Year: 1997
Duration: c. 17:00
Difficulty: VI (see Ratings for explanation)
Publisher: G. Schirmer
Cost: Score & Parts - Rental | Score Only - $25.00
Instrumentation
Full Score
Flute I-II-III (III doubling Piccolo)
Oboe I-II-III (III doubling English Horn)
Bassoon I-II-III (III doubling Contrabassoon)
B-flat Soprano Clarinet I-II-III (II doubling E-flat Soprano Clarinet, III doubling B-flat Bass Clarinet)
Soprano Saxophone
Alto Saxophone (doubling Tenor Saxophone)
C Trumpet I-II-III
Horn in F I-II-III-IV
Trombone I-II-III
Tuba
Percussion I-II, including:
- Crotales
- Marimba
- Sizzle Cymbal
- Suspended Cymbal
- Tam-Tam
- Timpani
- Triangle
- Vibraphone
Errata
None discovered thus far.
Program Notes
When the College Band Directors National Association asked me to do a piece for dancers and winds, it immediately suggested something classical, not our musical eighteenth century, but an imaginative vision of ancient worlds. The clear timbres of the winds, playing in small, unconventional chamber groups, constituted my first musical images. Along with these, I thought of an imagined harmony between dance, sport and sound that we can imagine from serene oranges and blacks on Greek vases, the celebration of bodies in motion that we see in the matchless sculpture of ancient times, and perhaps most important to this piece, the celebration of the ideal tableau, the moment frozen in time, that is present still in the friezes that adorn the temples and in the architecture of the temples themselves.
- Program Note by composer
Media
State Ratings
None discovered thus far.
Performances
To submit a performance please join The Wind Repertory Project
- University of Illinois (Champaign) Wind Symphony (Stephen G. Peterson, conductor) – 4 November 2018
Works for Winds by This Composer
- Fanfare for Foley’s
- Music for Eighteen Winds (1986)
- Olympic Dances (1997)
- Overture: Michael Kohlhaas
- Rubies (ed. Martin) (2006/2015)
- San Antonio
- Three City Blocks (1991)
Resources
- Harbison, J. (1997). Olympic Dances: For Wind Ensemble [score]. Associated Music Publishers: New York N.Y.
- Perusal score
- Scott, Judson. (2003). "John Harbison" from A Composer's Insight, Volume One." Galesville, MD: Meredith Music.