Contrabass
instruments | repertoire | strings | contrabass
Repertoire examples for Contrabass, based on recommendations from orchestration treatises and college syllabi.
KENNAN AND GRANTHAM (2002, P. 31), THE TECHNIQUE OF ORCHESTRATION.
Suggested listening for Contrabass. Playlist available here on Spotify.
“Beethoven, Fifth Symphony, 3rd movt., beginning; also beginning of Trio; Ninth Symphony, 4th movt., meas. 8.
Franck, Symphony in D minor, beginning. Verdi, Otello, beginning of Act IV, scene iii.
Saint-Saens, “The Elephant” from The Carnival ofAnimals.
Goldmark, Rustic Wedding Symphony, beginning.
Strauss, Also Sprach Zarathustra, fugue in the “Von der Wissenschaft” section (involves four desks of basses, each desk playing a separate part); Death and Transfiguration, 16 bars after letter D.
Mahler, Fourth Symphony, 3rd movt., figure 9 (basses playing pizzicato notes); First Symphony, 3rd movt., beginning (solo bass with mute).
Stravinsky, The Rite ofSpring, 1 bar after figure 121; Pulcinella, 7th movt. (duet between trombone and solo double bass).
Prokofiev, Lieutenant Kije, II. Romance.
Respighi, Pines of Rome, beginnings of Part IV (“Pines of the Appian Way”) (bottom string tuned down to low B).
P. M. Davies, A Mirror of Whitening Light, 1 bar after C.”
