Elsa's Procession to the Cathedral Richard Wagner / Arr. Lucien Cailliet

Titel / Title: Elsa's Procession to the Cathedral
Herausgeber / Publisher: Alfred Music Publications
Instrumentation: Concert Band
Produkttyp / Product: Partitur + Stimmen
Sprache / Language: English
ISBN: 9780757932625
UPC: 29156085655

Lucien Cailliets Konzertband-Arrangement von Richard Wagners Elsas-Prozession zur Kathedrale bewahrt die zeitlose Eleganz, die dieses Stück zum Standard gemacht hat.


CLASSIC BAND
Elsa's Procession to the Cathedral
Grade 4
RICHARD WAGNER
Transcribed by LUCIEN CAILLIET

PROGRAM NOTES
"Elsa's Procession to the Cathedral," with its medieval color and pageantry, prefaces her betrothal to Lohengrin, mystic
Knight of the Holy Grail, who comes to deliver the people of Brabant (Antwerp) from the Hungarian invaders.
In the operatic presentation, a large double chorus (representing the people of Antwerp) adds its song of solemn
praise to that of the orchestra. lt is in this music, mystic yet powerful, that we find Wagner striking out with those new
and intense musical thoughts that were to culminate in Tristan, The Ring, and Parsifal. Not quite emancipated from
the musical speech of his operatic contemporaries, one finds in the Lohengrin score those unmistakable flights into
musico-dramatic magnificence transcending all that preceded it in idiom and musical adventure.
In this transcription of "Elsa's Procession" for symphony band, Lucien Cailliet, with his great talent for instrumentation,
has succeeded in building into the instrumental framework of the modern band a true and delicate representation of
all that Wagner so eloquently describes with orchestra and chorus.
In the present score, the instrumental solo voices of the original score are paralleled, the choral voices deftly absorbed
in the rich instrumental texture and all the luxuriant Wagnerian color re-created in terms of the instrumentation for
the band.
There is nothing in the actual performing of this score that should prove hazardous for either technique or musicianship.
lt is advisable, however; to maintain a positive and definite legato at all times, only allowing the music to indicate a
definite climax eleven measures before the end, and here the climax should be worked gradually with more and more
rhythmic consciousness, avoiding any explosive crescendi and maintaining balance at all times. The pace of the work
should never exceed eighty to the quarter note.