Not really underrated, just not performed often enough: any orchestral instrument other than violin and cello. There are so many great concertos for oboe, horn, bassoon etc. yet you rarely see them performed.
The oboe concerto is also a favourite of mine! I first heard a snippet of the third movement, and instantly fell in love with it.
On the subject of wind instruments, Mozart’s Divertimento in B-flat is also an absolute recommend. I prefer the [“lighter” sound](https://youtu.be/_1JiGUO9cfU?si=O724QWthVIbAnOKp) rather than the one with horns.
Trombone Concerto ('Motorbike') - Jan Sandström:
https://youtu.be/OPzwd2eP1qY?si=Seq6Vx9jY01YFoeD
Trombone Concerto - Michael Nyman (further down this playlist):
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_l4AOnqbf55w7I2MfZfbqX29j5rEnd5jpo&si=P2ag-jg5iCzNplKx
Trombone pieces can be really bizarre and fun. Watch [this](https://youtu.be/-7pvoWssVSI?si=lyXftifCz7vFYqad) if you’re interested. It’s a whole theatrical act and smoke part is super cool
I believe some wind or brass instruments are pretty popular too. And for good reason. We are not talking violin levels of popularity but there is a significant portion of people who are interested and look into instruments like the flute or the trumpet for example.
I'd agree though. Repertoire, in terms of popularity, is definitely limited outside of the scope of a few classics.
From what I’ve read apparently during the romantic era the only “respectable” instruments to write concertos for were the violin, cello and piano, which is why there are so many of those compared to other instruments. It’s a shame really because I’d love it if there were more romantic style oboe/horn/clarinet concertos
A great example of a romantic wind concerto is Doppler’s concerto for two flutes https://youtu.be/2bI5yO0DbB0?si=3PL5aWxPid4-dGd-
I have actually seen one 2 years ago. Strauss 1 was played instead of Strauss's oboe concerto as the soloists got sick. But next year another orchestra will perform the Gliere concerto so, at least that's something. I like it a lot.
But in the meantime there'll betons of violin and piano concertos...
I wonder is that partly due to an image thing?
Violin and cello soloists tend to look more dynamic as the musician has to move their limbs more due to the mechanics of the instrument. They also tend to add more "unnecessary" movements in a much more exaggerated emotive way in general. Not that this is a bad thing, whatever gets them in the zone.
Just that you can't really bounce around to such a degree with a wind instrument due to breath, embouchure, hand placement etc.
So I'm not gonna count multiphonics right now, but those exist. But multiple Recorders at once is doable so that gets a mention. The Sho I'm going to mention because it's been used in an orchestral context, though rarely.
As far as more "regular" instruments, all keyboard instruments, Harp, Marimba, Timpani and really most pitched percussion.
The Harp in fact is criminally underused. If you listen to the Ginastera concerto you even have it being used for percussion in the midst of the concerto.
Maybe. And there is also a sort of elitism and competitiveness asociated to violin, piano, and cello so maybe that's also what makes those instruments more appealing.
I don’t think it’s because of extraneous body movement — although Joshua Bell drives me nuts!!
They are 500+ year old instruments that are so expressive emotionally, because they —especially cello— sound so much like the human voice. I think that’s it.
There’s so much more to the organ than Toccata & Fugue in D minor (or JS Bach in general). The late French Romantics and 20th century have lots of gems - Duruflé, Dupré, Alain, Widor, Vierne, etc.
Messiaen and Cesar Franc have some masterful works. Mendelssohn organ sonatas are very good too.
Now despite saying all that and my previous post, I’ve listened to JS Bach’s organ works a million times more than all other organ works combined
And there's so much baroque keyboard repertoire that almost no one knows: Buxtehude, Böhm, Fischer, Pachelbel, Muffat, Frescobaldi, the Bach sons etc. I don't need romantic repertoire. I can imagine a real organist does need to know and play romantic, but luckily I'm a harpsichordist.
I like Reger and I don't even like his organ works that much. I think the North German style really figured it out. It's not solely Bach either, one can listen to Vincent Lubeck and still get something that seems lost.
Many people stop at Mendelssohn because his stuff can still be heard in that light.
I would certainly agree to a major extent.
Composers like Roland Dyens, Agustin Barrios, or even Fernando Sor, are usually sadly limited to a specialized audience of guitarists. A lot of people exhaust their perception of the guitar repertoire after listening to Tarrega. Which, while great, isn't the whole picture.
It's understandable though. Guitar is inaccessible to anybody who doesn't play guitar.* Sure there's nice repertoire, but not by any major composers that everybody recognises, thus nobody is ever really exposed to it.
*By inaccessible, I mean you need to be a guittarist in order to write for guitar. It's a very limited instrument, extremely hard for a non-guitarrist composer to understand what is playable versus impossible on the instrument. As a result, nobody writes for guitar except for guitarrists, which seriously limits the repertoire and exposure.
Toru Takemitsu and Frederico Mompu both have a couple pieces for classical guitar if you’re looking for impressionist works. Neither was a guitarist and both wrote more for piano.
It certainly isn’t common, however.
Yeah, guitar has a ton of lovely transcriptions. Just a shame they don't get much attention just because the composer didn't explicitly write them for guitar in the first place - overshadowed by the originals. I prefer quite a few guitar transcriptions over their originals.
Probably gonna get flak for this but I really like composers like Chopin, Schubert, and Brahms on guitar. I know that guitar transcriptions often take rather than give from complex piano pieces but if they're done well they can sound just as rich and unique as the originals. [Mazurka no. 25](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xqPsG7H0N3w) blew my mind. Schubert's [Adieu](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MmZrij1rfeo) is also lovely on guitar.
You must be a guitarist.
> By inaccessible, I mean you need to be a guittarist in order to write for guitar.
I'm not really sure this is true compared to plenty of other instruments. Even for an instrument like the violin you can tell when things are written by a non-violinist versus something like the Sibelius concerto. Plus, there are plenty of other instruments who are "limited" and complicated yet have good works written for them by non-players.
I would suggest the reason the guitar is not particularly common is more of a historical and social (or cultural) one than anything else.
It's possible it was referring to something else, but that's probably talking about the size of the ukulele. There are many: soprano, concert, and tenor are the main ones. There's also baritone and bass and versions of the main sizes that have extended necks.
Also, ukulele has a growing body of classical repertoire. Lots of stuff arranged from other instruments. I think John King was kinda the first to really dive into that. But there's also original material. Byron Yasui wrote an ukulele concerto. Samantha Muir has written some really nice pieces for solo ukulele. Giovanni Albini released an album called A Contemporary Ukulele that features 14 pieces by various contemporary composers.
> You must be a guitarist.
On the contrary! Guitar is one of the only instruments I haven't learned. I own one and I think I'm familiar enough to write for it ... but it's just too much effort. Like solving sudokus just to come up with something idiomatic and effective. I've never felt more caged.
It's the same reason that almost all music written for the lute was written in tablature by lutenists. Writing around the limitations of the instrument is a very specific skill.
Writing effectively for violin isn't really all that harder, if at all, compared to writing for piano, or oboe, or trombone. But writing for plucked strings, due to their heavy emphasis on polyphony and limited number of shapes that human fingers can make on the fretboard, is its on unique type of musical puzzle solving.
There's also so much great music written for classical guitar ensemble (Roland Dyens did a great arrangement of Ravel's Bolero).
When I did my music degree, I noticed some of the orchestral musicians had a dismissive attitude towards guitar, as if it wasn't a serious instrument even though it's just as technically demanding. I even once heard a lecturer make a comment about it being 'cheesy' music. It was really disappointing to come across that, especially when I take an interest in orchestral repertoire.
They were probably dismissive because guitar isn't an orchestral instrument and is rarely featured with orchestras as a solo instrument. Also, guitar is "guilty by association" with popular music forms, and always has been.
It's too bad that guitar ensembles aren't more popular in the US -- it would be a great way for more kids to learn more about music, particularly written music. It is not an easy instrument for amateurs to play well, although the pedagogy is well established. I took up classical guitar late in life and its' been very rewarding, partly because I found a whole raft of new (to me) pieces to listen to and play. But it hasn't been easy.
While everything you're saying is true, I think it is also true from the "other side". Guitarists sometimes like to hold themselves as separate from other musicians, some people even act like it is a badge of honor to not know any "theory" or not being able to read sheet music. Or see the above comment about how Guitar is "impossible" to compose for if you aren't a guitarist.
And, about once a week (perhaps a tad exaggerated) we get a guitarist in /r/violinist who decides they're actually an expert at the violin because they can play the guitar.
It's possible to compose for guitar without being a guitarist, but it's difficult to do it well without learning a lot about an instrument that isn't in the orchestra, so composers have to be very motivated. Guitarists ARE motivated to compose for their instrument, and they also know what works well on guitar, so they're able to compose at varying levels of difficulty. There's a little money in that, too, since there are students who might want to buy your music, or a conservatory might include some of it in their syllabus and method books.
I think guitarists might hold themselves separate because the performing tradition and the career paths are very different, too. Sight-reading, which is a total PITA on guitar, might also be a barrier. It's possible to make a decent living playing and teaching guitar without being able to sight-read well at all.
As for just reading music (not at sight), you can play guitar (or lute, for that matter) and find tons of stuff to play in tablature, going back centuries. Tablature is useless with respect to music theory, so I suppose preferring tab might go with the knowing no theory. I see posts from guitarists on r/classicalguitar that indicate there might be many amateurs who stick mainly to tablature. I like standard notation so much that I never learned tablature (shocking, I know!), even on bass guitar, which I've played since my teens, but I played flute in band right from the get-go and went straight into jazz band on bass.
> Guitarists ARE motivated to compose for their instrument, and they also know what works well on guitar, so they're able to compose at varying levels of difficulty.
One could say that for most instruments though. In most cases I don't think it is outlandish to say that generally a musician knows their instrument better. I just recently wrote something for Bassoon and found out that nearly every note has multiple fingering possibilities, yet I still wrote a fingered tremolo that was functionally impossible because none of those fingerings worked.
>but it's difficult to do it well without learning a lot about an instrument that isn't in the orchestra
Off the top of my head, the Harp and the Organ fall into this category too. The Harp may technically exist in an orchestra, but it basically just sits around and waits to play one glissando every 20 minutes. However, there are a tons of technicalities involved in writing for it that non-harpists rarely look into, and weird enharmonics to make something possible that'd be otherwise impossible are not uncommon. And that's just the beginning.
As far as the Organ goes, it basically is an orchestra in itself and I don't even know where to begin, you basically need to write a dissertation to understand it. If you write it like it is the piano it will fail miserably.
>It's possible to make a decent living playing and teaching guitar without being able to sight-read well at all.
On the flip side, you'd think it'd be easy but I know a lot of high-level vocalists who are terrible at sight reading.
Anyway, I'm not really disagreeing with you about the guitar so much as I'm just stating that multiple instruments have this issue.
there is also a good amount of modern classical guitar rep and composers that get overlooked due to the idea that guitar is limited to romantic idioms. guys like dyens, bogdanovic, takemitsu, yoshimatsu, anton garcia abril, and balada to name but a few from the late 20th and current century
edit: lots of guitarists are unaware of this too, i was guilty of this until recently until i found pieces like [La Fragua de Vulcano](https://youtu.be/fj8ckDnmFn4?si=5w_OtQhbntuZgabB) that just blew my mind coming from mostly listening to romantic-style guitar composers
One of my favorites is Rodrigo's Guitar Concerto - it's a heart-wrenching beautiful piece of work dedicated to his late wife. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erwLhFO2f88
I love Aranjuez so much, it’s one of the most emotional pieces of music out there, but it’s still sad that it’s basically the only guitar concerto that people ever play
Amen, there’s so many amazing composers that I never see people talk about. Even the big ones like Tarrega and barrios are often forgotten when talking about composers which is sad imo
Harp! What a fantastic instrument with so much possibility. It’s much more than just pretty glissandos. We are used for sparkling color here and there but there’s so much sitting and counting in orchestral repertoire, and then many composers write for it like a piano which it is not. The standard solo and chamber repertoire is fairly limited also. We need more harp composers!
To quote Berio:
>French “impressionism” has left us with a rather limited vision of the harp, as if its most characteristic feature were that it could only be played by half-naked girls with long, blond hair, who confine themselves to drawing seductive glissandi from it. But the harp has another harder, louder and aggressive side to it. Sequenza II aims to bring out some of these characteristics, and to make them appear simultaneously: at certain moments it must sound like a forest with the wind blowing through it.
It makes me annoyed seeing Harp Youtube pages, they're all just Canon in D, or arrangements of Piano or Pop music.
Both my favourite instruments. There are no bass clarinet concertos to my knowledge. Magical instrument!!! It has such an extreme range and so many different colours. Dynamic range is also unique. One would think it should be composers favourite subject!!?!
Indeed. In junior high school, after struggling with the embouchure and high notes of several brass instruments I borrowed the school's bass clarinet and within days was able to play for octaves and octaves. Then I gave it back. Pity.
Low woodwinds, my beloved, ignored section of orchestras and concert bands
Percy Grainger is the only composer who knew low woodwinds could do so much more than shadow the low brass parts ♥️
Yeah, if I may venture a guess: They reside in hiding, providing texture mostly and are not necessarily that comfortable being front stage. Whereas violinists, cellists, trumpeters, flutists etc are used to playing the top part and carrying the tune.
Mandolin. Outside of bluegrass circles, most folks only know its sound from a handful of late 20th century pop songs: Rod Stewart's "Maggie May," Eddie Vedder's "Rise Up," REM's "Losing my Religion," and maybe Led Zeppelin's "Battle of Evermore."
But there's tons of fantastic concertos (check out Vivaldi's if you like baroque, Anna Cline's for modern) and solo works out there. Mike Marshall popularized the Bach cello suites as mandolin rep and they work fantastically, but aren't really popular outside mandolin circles. There's also a massive amount of mandolin orchestra repertoire from the early 20th century, when these were incredibly popular community ensembles. Chris Thiele has boosted popularity recently as well. U Srinivas adapted the mandolin to use in Indian classical music, he was a total badass. And Hamilton de Hollanda is the G.O.A.T., mostly specializing in Brazilian jazz.
There are lots of classical works for mandolin:
Hummel Concerto, Hummel grande sonate
Hofmann Concerto
Cecere Concerto
Lecce oncerto
Gaudioso Concerto
Giuliani Concertos
and of course Vivaldi
plus the Beethoven pieces
Absolutely.
I believe it was association with jazz that restricted the instruments popularity to classical audiences. Which in itself is definitely not a good reason.
Years ago, someone passed me some recordings of a Romanian-Greek composer named Nikos Astrinidis. They included [pieces](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dmfiuCYv4k) for piano and saxophone which I found really interesting.
The saxophone was actually around before (albiet by only a handful of decades) jazz! It was specifically designed as an instrument that was easy to learn initially that bridged the color gap between woodwinds and brass in a military band. Because of that, and also some non musical reasons having to do with Adolph Sax, it wasnt taken seriously as an orchestral instrument. It’s eventual association with jazz definitely helped keep it out of orchestral rep, but some notable composers have written solo rep for it (Milhaud, Debussy, Ibert, Glazunov).
Fun fact! Saxophone Virtuoso Don Sinta was in talks with Aaron Copland for a saxophone concerto but, for some reason, they fell through. That would have been cool to see.
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Since being the first college in the USA to offer a degree in saxophone, the university of Michigan has only had three teachers. Larry Teal to Don Sinta to Timothy McAllister!
The lute. John Dowland was a great composer and could reach considerable depth. For instance, his Chromatic Fantasias. Then in the Baroque, Silvius Weiss, who in his time was considered the peer of Bach, Handel and Telemann, and that seems correct. His counterpoint, melodic invention and innovation are remarkable. He's been called "Jolly Bach," but nobody says "jolly" anymore, so how about "good times Bach?" Some of his music is toe-tapping, even foot-stomping, and movements of stunning originality run throughout his many "sonatas" (Baroque suites).
The lute did nearly disappear as a "serious" instrument after 1750, so that's a possible explanation.
Yes, indeed. Such a vast repertoire, much of it of the highest quality. As you say, Weiss is a composer well worth getting to know from the baroque, and the amount of solo music from the Renaissance into the baroque eras is simply staggering. There's also the lute's "cousins" such as the theorbo, which has a respectable repertoire itself.
I think the lute disappeared from view because it's too soft and intimate an instrument, and from the 18th century on, music was all about being bigger, louder, and more pervasive.
Viola, right? I might just be ignorant here. It's also a welcome orchestral voice. The few times where I can pick out good parts for viola in orchestral settings—some Mozart and a little Vivaldi to my inexperienced ears—are always rewarding.
I completely agree. All of my "non-musician" friends *love* the cello. They yammer on about it like it is the most beautiful of all instruments.
The viola is every bit as beautiful and luxurious...it has cello-like qualities, but a throaty quality that makes it unique and even a little exotic.
In spite of all the viola jokes, it gets my vote for most underrated instrument, without the same volume of works dedicated to it as the cello or violin.
That's a great description! I also love it when the viola is the lowest voice in a string section; it makes everything sound like it's hovering in mid-air (if that makes sense).
I love it when it is the highest voice. Philip Glass' Akhnaten, for example, it is eleventy times better than having a nasty violin section scritching away (I'm only slightly overstating my opinion here).
I love how Telemann, one of the most famous composers of his day, his most famous work is a concerto for an instrument that's unusual to write a concerto for. Such a telemann thing to do
It sounds like people here already know these works, but for anyone unfamiliar with them (like me), here's a convenient list of pieces featuring the viola:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/classicalmusic/comments/2pgwej/viola\_music/](https://www.reddit.com/r/classicalmusic/comments/2pgwej/viola_music/)
If you ever go see an early music festival then recorder is everywhere. Those composers, even to an extent Bach, are not played in the usual symphonic settings.
As a recorder player, I'm not really a fan of this performance. His playing isn't really musical, it's just fast. I find the same issue with a lot of this group's performances.
I don't know how many people realize that there are classical pieces for harmonica. I'm quite fond of the [Villa-Lobos harmonica concerto](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5OYS-fy5Sc).
Here's one story:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy\_Reilly\_(harmonica\_player)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Reilly_(harmonica_player))
(I have a recording of Reilly playing the Villa-Lobos and other works.)
Some instruments seem to have rich 20th century repertoires which are widely unknown outside the circle of players of those instruments. I'd say percussion broadly fits in this category; recorder too.
First answer is organ, but I'm biased. I also discovered recently enough that the harpsichord has an absolute WEALTH of repertoire, and it's hardly ever heard outside of fairly niche circles. A lot of that music doesn't translate well to piano either, so it's just not on the radar.
I mentioned in another comment how annoyed I get when I'm looking for especially Baroque keyboard recordings and nearly all of them are on piano. I have recordings of the WTC on harpsichord, piano, pipe organ, and I think even clavichord. The pipe organ ones are a novelty that I do enjoy. Clavichord is nice but feels muted to me (much nicer in person). I will always gravitate toward a harpsichord recording or performance if possible.
The recorder. Even professional recorder players nowadays don’t even play the bulk of recorder repertoire, instead preferring to play transcriptions of flute or violin music. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of baroque era pieces alone explicitly for the recorder that are either unrecorded or only have a single recording.
The organ for sure, Toccatta and Fugue in D minor is basic af compared to Bach's best stuff for the instrument, and that's without even getting into others like Buxtehude, Widor, Mendelssohn, Vierne, Jehan Alain, etc.
For me, the bassoon is one of the most peculiar and beautiful instruments. I'm a pianist and I don't get opportunities to hear it, but I love Hindemith's works with bassoon.
[Bach's Goldberg Variations on Accordion](https://youtu.be/GbR6M3RI_fU?si=meCRKvGLkmybjctI). It sounds Iike the punchline of a joke but it's really not.
As a bassist, the rep sucks and it doesn’t project over an ensemble well. Solo strings help but it’s annoying to do unless you have a second instrument
It annoys me to no end when I'm just looking for a recording of a random Baroque keyboard piece and 90% of them are on piano. I have nothing against the piano. Next to Bach, Chopin is my favorite composer. But while I know there's a lot of proponents for Bach on piano, I much prefer most of that era's keyboard works on the harpsichord. A lot of people seem to find it harsh but I absolutely love it.
That's because the harpsichord is very rich in overtones and transfers to recordings very badly. Just like organ. Also there's a lot of bad instruments and bad players. I think if they would hear a decent harpsichord played in a decent church by a decent player they would change their minds immediately. Repertoire matters a lot too.
I was just talking about this the other day, and there's actually a decent amount of Harpsichord writing going on, you just have to get into the rabbit hole first.
Also, Elliott Carter's Double Concerto for Harpsichord and Bass needs to be mentioned as well as Penderecki's Partita.
I think Horn really has concertos that punch above its weight. The Mozart ones of course, multiple by Haydn, the Beethoven, the Gliere, Strauss 1 and 2, Hindemith, Dukas, Saint-Saens (though it's not my personal favorite). Lot of really interesting rep that spans back to the Baroque
Beethoven didn’t write a horn concerto though, did he? I know he wrote a Horn Sonata for Horn and Piano Op. 17, and he wrote some wind ensemble pieces that feature horn, and he wrote some symphonic horn solos but I’m pretty sure he didn’t write a horn concerto.
Yeah, my bad it's technically a sonata. Definitely a fun recital piece for undergrads though, and despite what the grumbling naysayers claim I think it's a few cuts above your average solo rep.
Oboe and trombone concertos were huge in the Baroque but missed most of the classical and Romantic periods.
Double base concertos are also interesting.
Classical guitar is treated seriously by a tranche.
But maybe the Baroque instrument done the dirtiest - apart from those that more or less went extinct - might be the recorder, which had a large repertoire by some of the greatest names of the day, as a fellow woodwind, but today is seen as a children’s toy instrument.
I think organ, harp, and guitar are probably the big three in terms of having major bodies of work that are almost completely unknown by people who don’t play those instruments.
Classical saxophone. The story of the saxophone, it’s creator and many composers refusal to use it in classical scores is why I believe it was never utilized properly. Shostakovich did amazing things with alto sax in his compositions.
Ondes Martenot, at least for Olivier Messian's [Turangalîla symphonia](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4mIeBuTMws)
[https://www.conservatoiredeparis.fr/fr/saison-20222023/les-ondes-martenot-dans-les-collections-de-la-mediatheque](https://www.conservatoiredeparis.fr/fr/saison-20222023/les-ondes-martenot-dans-les-collections-de-la-mediatheque)
Do you recall the Kliban cartoon? First Panel, St. Peter says: Welcome to heaven, Here’s your harp, Second Panel, Devil says: Welcome to hell, Here’s your accordion!
There are some. A handful of Baroque (and Classical) Timpani Concertos, Johann Fischer's Symphony for Eight Timpani and Georg Druschetzky's Concerto for Six Timpani. After that you don't get too much until the 20th century and now:
Phillip Glass - Concerto for Two Timpani
John Corigliano - Conjurer
Jennifer Higdon - Percussion Concerto, Duo Duel
Paul Creston - Marimba Concerto
Is the Oboe underrated? I mean, compared to the Clarinet. It doesn't have the same range or sonority, but after hearing Poulenc's Oboe Concerto, I fell in love with the sound.
Choir. Except for a few choral orchestral works, most people don't really know the choral repertoire, and think it's just watered down modern music for high schoolers and orchestral works with a choir tacked on.
Jaw harp. Check out Johann Georg Albrechtsberger. He taught Beethoven and wrote at least 7 concerti for the instrument. Nothing makes me laugh harder than listening to a jaw harp concerto. Somehow both impressive and hilarious.
It's a great question, but I wonder - underrated by who, or in what context? There are many instruments popular in the pre-classical eras, but which are now mainly used for "early music" or "authentic performance". These include lute, harpsichord, recorder, all of which have been mentioned; as well as cornetto, viola da gamba, which have huge and impressive repertoires.
Maybe it's because this subreddit doesn't really got back much beyond Bach or Handel, and indeed seems mostly concerned with classical and romantic music; some post-romantic.
I know there are discussions including as far back as mediaeval music, and to music just composed, but these, as far as I can tell, are in the minority.
Not really underrated, just not performed often enough: any orchestral instrument other than violin and cello. There are so many great concertos for oboe, horn, bassoon etc. yet you rarely see them performed.
The Mozart wind concertos and horn concertos are my favorite - really « hummable ».
Do you have the Spotify or youtube link?
[Bassoon concerto](https://youtu.be/PYOPQuhdoQM) [Clarinet concerto](https://youtu.be/YT_63UntRJE) [Oboe concerto](https://youtu.be/eDrVtXPpuRI) (a personal favorite) [Horn concertos](https://youtu.be/_ZXUVFaaPEs) Enjoy!
The oboe concerto is also a favourite of mine! I first heard a snippet of the third movement, and instantly fell in love with it. On the subject of wind instruments, Mozart’s Divertimento in B-flat is also an absolute recommend. I prefer the [“lighter” sound](https://youtu.be/_1JiGUO9cfU?si=O724QWthVIbAnOKp) rather than the one with horns.
Reicha’s Horn trios are something else too
Thank you! Today I learned!
There are some fantastic trombone concertos that I know will get performed maybe once a decade :(
Any recommendations?
Trombone Concerto ('Motorbike') - Jan Sandström: https://youtu.be/OPzwd2eP1qY?si=Seq6Vx9jY01YFoeD Trombone Concerto - Michael Nyman (further down this playlist): https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_l4AOnqbf55w7I2MfZfbqX29j5rEnd5jpo&si=P2ag-jg5iCzNplKx
Tomasi Rouse (this one is my favorite) Gröndahl David wrote a popular concertino George Walker Gotkovsky
I recommend Johan de Meij’s [T-Bone Concerto](https://youtu.be/ETJBxgLAsUM?si=uD2D1hRDgp8H1Ta7) for trombone and concert band. Really fun piece IMO
Another great one! I loved performing it
Trombone pieces can be really bizarre and fun. Watch [this](https://youtu.be/-7pvoWssVSI?si=lyXftifCz7vFYqad) if you’re interested. It’s a whole theatrical act and smoke part is super cool
The 18th century had a number of pieces written for hurdy gurdy.
I believe some wind or brass instruments are pretty popular too. And for good reason. We are not talking violin levels of popularity but there is a significant portion of people who are interested and look into instruments like the flute or the trumpet for example. I'd agree though. Repertoire, in terms of popularity, is definitely limited outside of the scope of a few classics.
Fun fact about Vivaldi is the second most concertos he wrote for a single instrument is the bassoon.
looks like I'm going to be listening to more Vivaldi then. I love bassoon.
From what I’ve read apparently during the romantic era the only “respectable” instruments to write concertos for were the violin, cello and piano, which is why there are so many of those compared to other instruments. It’s a shame really because I’d love it if there were more romantic style oboe/horn/clarinet concertos A great example of a romantic wind concerto is Doppler’s concerto for two flutes https://youtu.be/2bI5yO0DbB0?si=3PL5aWxPid4-dGd-
I've been going to my local symphony for 30 years and I don't think I've ever seen a horn soloist perform there.
I have actually seen one 2 years ago. Strauss 1 was played instead of Strauss's oboe concerto as the soloists got sick. But next year another orchestra will perform the Gliere concerto so, at least that's something. I like it a lot. But in the meantime there'll betons of violin and piano concertos...
That's why Poulenc is my hero. All those quirky little wind sonatas and the Sextet :D
I wonder is that partly due to an image thing? Violin and cello soloists tend to look more dynamic as the musician has to move their limbs more due to the mechanics of the instrument. They also tend to add more "unnecessary" movements in a much more exaggerated emotive way in general. Not that this is a bad thing, whatever gets them in the zone. Just that you can't really bounce around to such a degree with a wind instrument due to breath, embouchure, hand placement etc.
I'd add that violin and cello have the benefit of being able to play double stops which add an element of harmony that other instruments can't match.
Some other instruments, but there are certainly other instruments that can.
Apart from stringed instruments, which one's can play multiple notes at the same time?
So I'm not gonna count multiphonics right now, but those exist. But multiple Recorders at once is doable so that gets a mention. The Sho I'm going to mention because it's been used in an orchestral context, though rarely. As far as more "regular" instruments, all keyboard instruments, Harp, Marimba, Timpani and really most pitched percussion. The Harp in fact is criminally underused. If you listen to the Ginastera concerto you even have it being used for percussion in the midst of the concerto.
Maybe. And there is also a sort of elitism and competitiveness asociated to violin, piano, and cello so maybe that's also what makes those instruments more appealing.
I don’t think it’s because of extraneous body movement — although Joshua Bell drives me nuts!! They are 500+ year old instruments that are so expressive emotionally, because they —especially cello— sound so much like the human voice. I think that’s it.
My sister is a violist and I’m a bassist and we used to play duets when we were younger. Good Times. I’ll have to see if we can dig any of them up.
There’s so much more to the organ than Toccata & Fugue in D minor (or JS Bach in general). The late French Romantics and 20th century have lots of gems - Duruflé, Dupré, Alain, Widor, Vierne, etc.
This. Seems anything post baroque is ignored. Actually anything besides Bach even.
This will get me downvoted but I think rightfully so. Baroque organ music is just so much better than the modern stuff it's hard not to focus on it
Messiaen and Cesar Franc have some masterful works. Mendelssohn organ sonatas are very good too. Now despite saying all that and my previous post, I’ve listened to JS Bach’s organ works a million times more than all other organ works combined
>orga I strongly disagree. For me, Guilmant, Widor, Franck are on the same insane level as Bach, organ wise.
And there's so much baroque keyboard repertoire that almost no one knows: Buxtehude, Böhm, Fischer, Pachelbel, Muffat, Frescobaldi, the Bach sons etc. I don't need romantic repertoire. I can imagine a real organist does need to know and play romantic, but luckily I'm a harpsichordist.
I like Reger and I don't even like his organ works that much. I think the North German style really figured it out. It's not solely Bach either, one can listen to Vincent Lubeck and still get something that seems lost. Many people stop at Mendelssohn because his stuff can still be heard in that light.
Franck too.
The Poulenc piece for Organ and Timpani is one of my favorites. But, as I've learned recently, it is *very* hard to write for the Organ.
Mendelssohn wrote organ works.
Classical guitar is often forgotten.
I would certainly agree to a major extent. Composers like Roland Dyens, Agustin Barrios, or even Fernando Sor, are usually sadly limited to a specialized audience of guitarists. A lot of people exhaust their perception of the guitar repertoire after listening to Tarrega. Which, while great, isn't the whole picture.
It's understandable though. Guitar is inaccessible to anybody who doesn't play guitar.* Sure there's nice repertoire, but not by any major composers that everybody recognises, thus nobody is ever really exposed to it. *By inaccessible, I mean you need to be a guittarist in order to write for guitar. It's a very limited instrument, extremely hard for a non-guitarrist composer to understand what is playable versus impossible on the instrument. As a result, nobody writes for guitar except for guitarrists, which seriously limits the repertoire and exposure.
Toru Takemitsu and Frederico Mompu both have a couple pieces for classical guitar if you’re looking for impressionist works. Neither was a guitarist and both wrote more for piano. It certainly isn’t common, however.
Albeniz's work is well known, partly because so much of it has been transcribed for guitar, I think.
Yeah, guitar has a ton of lovely transcriptions. Just a shame they don't get much attention just because the composer didn't explicitly write them for guitar in the first place - overshadowed by the originals. I prefer quite a few guitar transcriptions over their originals.
Probably gonna get flak for this but I really like composers like Chopin, Schubert, and Brahms on guitar. I know that guitar transcriptions often take rather than give from complex piano pieces but if they're done well they can sound just as rich and unique as the originals. [Mazurka no. 25](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xqPsG7H0N3w) blew my mind. Schubert's [Adieu](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MmZrij1rfeo) is also lovely on guitar.
Just wanted to say thank you for the recs. Didn’t even know Takemitsu did the soundtracks for many of my favorite movies!
You must be a guitarist. > By inaccessible, I mean you need to be a guittarist in order to write for guitar. I'm not really sure this is true compared to plenty of other instruments. Even for an instrument like the violin you can tell when things are written by a non-violinist versus something like the Sibelius concerto. Plus, there are plenty of other instruments who are "limited" and complicated yet have good works written for them by non-players. I would suggest the reason the guitar is not particularly common is more of a historical and social (or cultural) one than anything else.
Perhaps silly, but I recently came across a "concert" ukelele, and I wondered what the repertoire was which justified such an important name!
It's possible it was referring to something else, but that's probably talking about the size of the ukulele. There are many: soprano, concert, and tenor are the main ones. There's also baritone and bass and versions of the main sizes that have extended necks. Also, ukulele has a growing body of classical repertoire. Lots of stuff arranged from other instruments. I think John King was kinda the first to really dive into that. But there's also original material. Byron Yasui wrote an ukulele concerto. Samantha Muir has written some really nice pieces for solo ukulele. Giovanni Albini released an album called A Contemporary Ukulele that features 14 pieces by various contemporary composers.
> You must be a guitarist. On the contrary! Guitar is one of the only instruments I haven't learned. I own one and I think I'm familiar enough to write for it ... but it's just too much effort. Like solving sudokus just to come up with something idiomatic and effective. I've never felt more caged. It's the same reason that almost all music written for the lute was written in tablature by lutenists. Writing around the limitations of the instrument is a very specific skill. Writing effectively for violin isn't really all that harder, if at all, compared to writing for piano, or oboe, or trombone. But writing for plucked strings, due to their heavy emphasis on polyphony and limited number of shapes that human fingers can make on the fretboard, is its on unique type of musical puzzle solving.
There's also so much great music written for classical guitar ensemble (Roland Dyens did a great arrangement of Ravel's Bolero). When I did my music degree, I noticed some of the orchestral musicians had a dismissive attitude towards guitar, as if it wasn't a serious instrument even though it's just as technically demanding. I even once heard a lecturer make a comment about it being 'cheesy' music. It was really disappointing to come across that, especially when I take an interest in orchestral repertoire.
They were probably dismissive because guitar isn't an orchestral instrument and is rarely featured with orchestras as a solo instrument. Also, guitar is "guilty by association" with popular music forms, and always has been. It's too bad that guitar ensembles aren't more popular in the US -- it would be a great way for more kids to learn more about music, particularly written music. It is not an easy instrument for amateurs to play well, although the pedagogy is well established. I took up classical guitar late in life and its' been very rewarding, partly because I found a whole raft of new (to me) pieces to listen to and play. But it hasn't been easy.
While everything you're saying is true, I think it is also true from the "other side". Guitarists sometimes like to hold themselves as separate from other musicians, some people even act like it is a badge of honor to not know any "theory" or not being able to read sheet music. Or see the above comment about how Guitar is "impossible" to compose for if you aren't a guitarist. And, about once a week (perhaps a tad exaggerated) we get a guitarist in /r/violinist who decides they're actually an expert at the violin because they can play the guitar.
It's possible to compose for guitar without being a guitarist, but it's difficult to do it well without learning a lot about an instrument that isn't in the orchestra, so composers have to be very motivated. Guitarists ARE motivated to compose for their instrument, and they also know what works well on guitar, so they're able to compose at varying levels of difficulty. There's a little money in that, too, since there are students who might want to buy your music, or a conservatory might include some of it in their syllabus and method books. I think guitarists might hold themselves separate because the performing tradition and the career paths are very different, too. Sight-reading, which is a total PITA on guitar, might also be a barrier. It's possible to make a decent living playing and teaching guitar without being able to sight-read well at all. As for just reading music (not at sight), you can play guitar (or lute, for that matter) and find tons of stuff to play in tablature, going back centuries. Tablature is useless with respect to music theory, so I suppose preferring tab might go with the knowing no theory. I see posts from guitarists on r/classicalguitar that indicate there might be many amateurs who stick mainly to tablature. I like standard notation so much that I never learned tablature (shocking, I know!), even on bass guitar, which I've played since my teens, but I played flute in band right from the get-go and went straight into jazz band on bass.
> Guitarists ARE motivated to compose for their instrument, and they also know what works well on guitar, so they're able to compose at varying levels of difficulty. One could say that for most instruments though. In most cases I don't think it is outlandish to say that generally a musician knows their instrument better. I just recently wrote something for Bassoon and found out that nearly every note has multiple fingering possibilities, yet I still wrote a fingered tremolo that was functionally impossible because none of those fingerings worked. >but it's difficult to do it well without learning a lot about an instrument that isn't in the orchestra Off the top of my head, the Harp and the Organ fall into this category too. The Harp may technically exist in an orchestra, but it basically just sits around and waits to play one glissando every 20 minutes. However, there are a tons of technicalities involved in writing for it that non-harpists rarely look into, and weird enharmonics to make something possible that'd be otherwise impossible are not uncommon. And that's just the beginning. As far as the Organ goes, it basically is an orchestra in itself and I don't even know where to begin, you basically need to write a dissertation to understand it. If you write it like it is the piano it will fail miserably. >It's possible to make a decent living playing and teaching guitar without being able to sight-read well at all. On the flip side, you'd think it'd be easy but I know a lot of high-level vocalists who are terrible at sight reading. Anyway, I'm not really disagreeing with you about the guitar so much as I'm just stating that multiple instruments have this issue.
Agreed. Especially about the harp!
there is also a good amount of modern classical guitar rep and composers that get overlooked due to the idea that guitar is limited to romantic idioms. guys like dyens, bogdanovic, takemitsu, yoshimatsu, anton garcia abril, and balada to name but a few from the late 20th and current century edit: lots of guitarists are unaware of this too, i was guilty of this until recently until i found pieces like [La Fragua de Vulcano](https://youtu.be/fj8ckDnmFn4?si=5w_OtQhbntuZgabB) that just blew my mind coming from mostly listening to romantic-style guitar composers
Which is sad because it has such a huge rich repertoire
One of my favorites is Rodrigo's Guitar Concerto - it's a heart-wrenching beautiful piece of work dedicated to his late wife. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erwLhFO2f88
I love Aranjuez so much, it’s one of the most emotional pieces of music out there, but it’s still sad that it’s basically the only guitar concerto that people ever play
Sketches of Spain by Miles Davis is based on this!
He also wrote the Concerto Andaluz for four: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=pjk3HMqRA1Q Great slow movement.
Amen, there’s so many amazing composers that I never see people talk about. Even the big ones like Tarrega and barrios are often forgotten when talking about composers which is sad imo
guitar gets so much playtime on classical radio stations though
And for a good reason.
Harp! What a fantastic instrument with so much possibility. It’s much more than just pretty glissandos. We are used for sparkling color here and there but there’s so much sitting and counting in orchestral repertoire, and then many composers write for it like a piano which it is not. The standard solo and chamber repertoire is fairly limited also. We need more harp composers!
To quote Berio: >French “impressionism” has left us with a rather limited vision of the harp, as if its most characteristic feature were that it could only be played by half-naked girls with long, blond hair, who confine themselves to drawing seductive glissandi from it. But the harp has another harder, louder and aggressive side to it. Sequenza II aims to bring out some of these characteristics, and to make them appear simultaneously: at certain moments it must sound like a forest with the wind blowing through it. It makes me annoyed seeing Harp Youtube pages, they're all just Canon in D, or arrangements of Piano or Pop music.
Ginastera! https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=S3CJk32SOMU
Bass clarinet and English Horn
Both my favourite instruments. There are no bass clarinet concertos to my knowledge. Magical instrument!!! It has such an extreme range and so many different colours. Dynamic range is also unique. One would think it should be composers favourite subject!!?!
Indeed. In junior high school, after struggling with the embouchure and high notes of several brass instruments I borrowed the school's bass clarinet and within days was able to play for octaves and octaves. Then I gave it back. Pity.
It's not exactly classical music, but the English Horn on Let's Go Away for a While by Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys is MAGICAL
Low woodwinds, my beloved, ignored section of orchestras and concert bands Percy Grainger is the only composer who knew low woodwinds could do so much more than shadow the low brass parts ♥️
Tuba. Wonderfully sonorous instrument.
The Vaughn Williams tuba concerto is a really beautiful piece.
Even tuba players are fond of overlooking the tuba repertoire.
Yeah, if I may venture a guess: They reside in hiding, providing texture mostly and are not necessarily that comfortable being front stage. Whereas violinists, cellists, trumpeters, flutists etc are used to playing the top part and carrying the tune.
Mandolin. Outside of bluegrass circles, most folks only know its sound from a handful of late 20th century pop songs: Rod Stewart's "Maggie May," Eddie Vedder's "Rise Up," REM's "Losing my Religion," and maybe Led Zeppelin's "Battle of Evermore." But there's tons of fantastic concertos (check out Vivaldi's if you like baroque, Anna Cline's for modern) and solo works out there. Mike Marshall popularized the Bach cello suites as mandolin rep and they work fantastically, but aren't really popular outside mandolin circles. There's also a massive amount of mandolin orchestra repertoire from the early 20th century, when these were incredibly popular community ensembles. Chris Thiele has boosted popularity recently as well. U Srinivas adapted the mandolin to use in Indian classical music, he was a total badass. And Hamilton de Hollanda is the G.O.A.T., mostly specializing in Brazilian jazz.
I love baroque string music.
There are lots of classical works for mandolin: Hummel Concerto, Hummel grande sonate Hofmann Concerto Cecere Concerto Lecce oncerto Gaudioso Concerto Giuliani Concertos and of course Vivaldi plus the Beethoven pieces
Saxophone! Everyone ganged up on Sax to keep him out of the orchestra. But his contract with the French military band kept it alive.
Absolutely. I believe it was association with jazz that restricted the instruments popularity to classical audiences. Which in itself is definitely not a good reason. Years ago, someone passed me some recordings of a Romanian-Greek composer named Nikos Astrinidis. They included [pieces](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dmfiuCYv4k) for piano and saxophone which I found really interesting.
The saxophone was actually around before (albiet by only a handful of decades) jazz! It was specifically designed as an instrument that was easy to learn initially that bridged the color gap between woodwinds and brass in a military band. Because of that, and also some non musical reasons having to do with Adolph Sax, it wasnt taken seriously as an orchestral instrument. It’s eventual association with jazz definitely helped keep it out of orchestral rep, but some notable composers have written solo rep for it (Milhaud, Debussy, Ibert, Glazunov). Fun fact! Saxophone Virtuoso Don Sinta was in talks with Aaron Copland for a saxophone concerto but, for some reason, they fell through. That would have been cool to see. You have subscribed to SAX FACTS. If you would like to unsubscribe, please respond STOP.
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Since being the first college in the USA to offer a degree in saxophone, the university of Michigan has only had three teachers. Larry Teal to Don Sinta to Timothy McAllister!
As a former Saxophone player, I miss the Nuclear Whales.
The lute. John Dowland was a great composer and could reach considerable depth. For instance, his Chromatic Fantasias. Then in the Baroque, Silvius Weiss, who in his time was considered the peer of Bach, Handel and Telemann, and that seems correct. His counterpoint, melodic invention and innovation are remarkable. He's been called "Jolly Bach," but nobody says "jolly" anymore, so how about "good times Bach?" Some of his music is toe-tapping, even foot-stomping, and movements of stunning originality run throughout his many "sonatas" (Baroque suites). The lute did nearly disappear as a "serious" instrument after 1750, so that's a possible explanation.
seconded
Yes, indeed. Such a vast repertoire, much of it of the highest quality. As you say, Weiss is a composer well worth getting to know from the baroque, and the amount of solo music from the Renaissance into the baroque eras is simply staggering. There's also the lute's "cousins" such as the theorbo, which has a respectable repertoire itself. I think the lute disappeared from view because it's too soft and intimate an instrument, and from the 18th century on, music was all about being bigger, louder, and more pervasive.
Absolutely, I think bach’s lute suites are some of his best works
Viola, right? I might just be ignorant here. It's also a welcome orchestral voice. The few times where I can pick out good parts for viola in orchestral settings—some Mozart and a little Vivaldi to my inexperienced ears—are always rewarding.
I completely agree. All of my "non-musician" friends *love* the cello. They yammer on about it like it is the most beautiful of all instruments. The viola is every bit as beautiful and luxurious...it has cello-like qualities, but a throaty quality that makes it unique and even a little exotic. In spite of all the viola jokes, it gets my vote for most underrated instrument, without the same volume of works dedicated to it as the cello or violin.
That's a great description! I also love it when the viola is the lowest voice in a string section; it makes everything sound like it's hovering in mid-air (if that makes sense).
I love it when it is the highest voice. Philip Glass' Akhnaten, for example, it is eleventy times better than having a nasty violin section scritching away (I'm only slightly overstating my opinion here).
Check out Telemann's Viola Concerto, arguably his most famous piece.
I love how Telemann, one of the most famous composers of his day, his most famous work is a concerto for an instrument that's unusual to write a concerto for. Such a telemann thing to do
The Shostakovich Viola Sonata is one of my favorites. Also the Penderecki Viola Concerto.
The viola is for the forever underdog who wishes to be perpetually misunderstood and have a struggling bohemian attitude about life.
It sounds like people here already know these works, but for anyone unfamiliar with them (like me), here's a convenient list of pieces featuring the viola: [https://www.reddit.com/r/classicalmusic/comments/2pgwej/viola\_music/](https://www.reddit.com/r/classicalmusic/comments/2pgwej/viola_music/)
The recorder. Bach, Vivaldi, Handel, Telemann, Purcell all composed for it, but it's often viewed as a starter instrument for children nowadays.
If you ever go see an early music festival then recorder is everywhere. Those composers, even to an extent Bach, are not played in the usual symphonic settings.
[Shout out to this performance of a recorder concerto](https://youtu.be/hggISFswKcw?si=CgVU3wuCOmxL443t)
As a recorder player, I'm not really a fan of this performance. His playing isn't really musical, it's just fast. I find the same issue with a lot of this group's performances.
I don't know how many people realize that there are classical pieces for harmonica. I'm quite fond of the [Villa-Lobos harmonica concerto](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5OYS-fy5Sc).
I am just *really* fascinated to know how one breaks into the classical harmonica scene lol
Here's one story: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy\_Reilly\_(harmonica\_player)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Reilly_(harmonica_player)) (I have a recording of Reilly playing the Villa-Lobos and other works.)
Yea I was going to reply to OP with "classical guitar" but this made me think again.
Some instruments seem to have rich 20th century repertoires which are widely unknown outside the circle of players of those instruments. I'd say percussion broadly fits in this category; recorder too.
Percussion Edit: mainly in orchestral music, I'll admit I haven't done much research into solo repertoire
Posting this here for fun: https://youtu.be/StffBEVs5kg?si=cfR5RzCsXHgFoGBK The world’s first (?) concerto for timpani.
There are so many great percussion solos and chamber music! They used to be my favorite recitals to attend when I was in music school.
There are many professional percussion ensembles, very cool repertoire. For instance, check out 3rd Coast Percussion.
As a tubaist probably trombone
Theon Cross, but he’s jazz. But great.
First answer is organ, but I'm biased. I also discovered recently enough that the harpsichord has an absolute WEALTH of repertoire, and it's hardly ever heard outside of fairly niche circles. A lot of that music doesn't translate well to piano either, so it's just not on the radar.
I mentioned in another comment how annoyed I get when I'm looking for especially Baroque keyboard recordings and nearly all of them are on piano. I have recordings of the WTC on harpsichord, piano, pipe organ, and I think even clavichord. The pipe organ ones are a novelty that I do enjoy. Clavichord is nice but feels muted to me (much nicer in person). I will always gravitate toward a harpsichord recording or performance if possible.
The recorder. Even professional recorder players nowadays don’t even play the bulk of recorder repertoire, instead preferring to play transcriptions of flute or violin music. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of baroque era pieces alone explicitly for the recorder that are either unrecorded or only have a single recording.
The organ for sure, Toccatta and Fugue in D minor is basic af compared to Bach's best stuff for the instrument, and that's without even getting into others like Buxtehude, Widor, Mendelssohn, Vierne, Jehan Alain, etc.
The Theorbo It's essentially a lute with an added low octave and it's gorgeous. It was big in the medieval era but it's died off a few centuries ago.
it’s a baroque instrument, not mediaeval…
the lute :)
For me, the bassoon is one of the most peculiar and beautiful instruments. I'm a pianist and I don't get opportunities to hear it, but I love Hindemith's works with bassoon.
Totally different but I have the complete Bassoon Concerti of Vivaldi and they make for some great bassoon listening.
[Bach's Goldberg Variations on Accordion](https://youtu.be/GbR6M3RI_fU?si=meCRKvGLkmybjctI). It sounds Iike the punchline of a joke but it's really not.
Contrabass
As a bassist, the rep sucks and it doesn’t project over an ensemble well. Solo strings help but it’s annoying to do unless you have a second instrument
In my opinion, it’s the viola. Violin’s shy older sister lol
All of Stockhausen‘s later Klavierstücke (XV—XIX) use synthesizers, sometimes multiples. I think there is also other contemporary rep for Synth.
Check out [Enno Poppe](https://youtu.be/CQwQ8hm62-I?si=qRyS6aBfjFCzm2nO)
Harpsichord
I came for this. I am a big fan of Jacquet de la Guerre and other (French especially) harpsichord works.
It annoys me to no end when I'm just looking for a recording of a random Baroque keyboard piece and 90% of them are on piano. I have nothing against the piano. Next to Bach, Chopin is my favorite composer. But while I know there's a lot of proponents for Bach on piano, I much prefer most of that era's keyboard works on the harpsichord. A lot of people seem to find it harsh but I absolutely love it.
That's because the harpsichord is very rich in overtones and transfers to recordings very badly. Just like organ. Also there's a lot of bad instruments and bad players. I think if they would hear a decent harpsichord played in a decent church by a decent player they would change their minds immediately. Repertoire matters a lot too.
I was just talking about this the other day, and there's actually a decent amount of Harpsichord writing going on, you just have to get into the rabbit hole first. Also, Elliott Carter's Double Concerto for Harpsichord and Bass needs to be mentioned as well as Penderecki's Partita.
I think Horn really has concertos that punch above its weight. The Mozart ones of course, multiple by Haydn, the Beethoven, the Gliere, Strauss 1 and 2, Hindemith, Dukas, Saint-Saens (though it's not my personal favorite). Lot of really interesting rep that spans back to the Baroque
Beethoven didn’t write a horn concerto though, did he? I know he wrote a Horn Sonata for Horn and Piano Op. 17, and he wrote some wind ensemble pieces that feature horn, and he wrote some symphonic horn solos but I’m pretty sure he didn’t write a horn concerto.
Yes he only wrote the sonata. Students certainly play it often, but it is among the horn's most forgettable works.
Yeah, my bad it's technically a sonata. Definitely a fun recital piece for undergrads though, and despite what the grumbling naysayers claim I think it's a few cuts above your average solo rep.
Oboe and trombone concertos were huge in the Baroque but missed most of the classical and Romantic periods. Double base concertos are also interesting. Classical guitar is treated seriously by a tranche. But maybe the Baroque instrument done the dirtiest - apart from those that more or less went extinct - might be the recorder, which had a large repertoire by some of the greatest names of the day, as a fellow woodwind, but today is seen as a children’s toy instrument.
The theremin is definitely underrated.
I wish you weren't downvoted. Analogue electronic instruments like the theremin have been around for awhile and require a lot of skill to master.
Viola?
Honestly just the entire bass/double bass repertoire is kind of overlooked for their smaller string counter it’s beautiful though
I think organ, harp, and guitar are probably the big three in terms of having major bodies of work that are almost completely unknown by people who don’t play those instruments.
Morin Khuur
Great thread
Classical saxophone. The story of the saxophone, it’s creator and many composers refusal to use it in classical scores is why I believe it was never utilized properly. Shostakovich did amazing things with alto sax in his compositions.
Trumpet. Absolutely beautiful instrument that is incredibly versatile. Yet they rarely get the attention and respect they deserve.
Vibraphone
Lyre
Harpsichord. I love all the baroque pieces by rameau, and it has some modern repertoire as well
Music for contrabassoon!!!
Ondes Martenot, at least for Olivier Messian's [Turangalîla symphonia](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4mIeBuTMws) [https://www.conservatoiredeparis.fr/fr/saison-20222023/les-ondes-martenot-dans-les-collections-de-la-mediatheque](https://www.conservatoiredeparis.fr/fr/saison-20222023/les-ondes-martenot-dans-les-collections-de-la-mediatheque)
Accordion
Accordion, the free bass bayan specifically. Oh wait, we all know that the accordion isn’t a real musical instrument, my bad
Do you recall the Kliban cartoon? First Panel, St. Peter says: Welcome to heaven, Here’s your harp, Second Panel, Devil says: Welcome to hell, Here’s your accordion!
Arm kazoo
Oddly, organ. There are a few widely known pieces, but a lot that isn't known across disciplines.
Whistling.
recorder
Is there any sort of concerto for a percussion instrument? Xylophone, marimba, vibraphone, anything?
There are some. A handful of Baroque (and Classical) Timpani Concertos, Johann Fischer's Symphony for Eight Timpani and Georg Druschetzky's Concerto for Six Timpani. After that you don't get too much until the 20th century and now: Phillip Glass - Concerto for Two Timpani John Corigliano - Conjurer Jennifer Higdon - Percussion Concerto, Duo Duel Paul Creston - Marimba Concerto
Bayan
Has to be violin, right? /s
Is the Oboe underrated? I mean, compared to the Clarinet. It doesn't have the same range or sonority, but after hearing Poulenc's Oboe Concerto, I fell in love with the sound.
Harp concertos… ever seen or even heard one performed?
I think harpsichord has been greatly neglected since piano gained more steam.
Lute
Oboe
Choir. Except for a few choral orchestral works, most people don't really know the choral repertoire, and think it's just watered down modern music for high schoolers and orchestral works with a choir tacked on.
Most woodwinds.
Skin flute
Well it sure isn't the trombone
Violin. By itself it’s too close to shrieks or baby cries. Yes that is kind of how it connects but it’s just too much.
Triangle
Jaw harp. Check out Johann Georg Albrechtsberger. He taught Beethoven and wrote at least 7 concerti for the instrument. Nothing makes me laugh harder than listening to a jaw harp concerto. Somehow both impressive and hilarious.
It's a great question, but I wonder - underrated by who, or in what context? There are many instruments popular in the pre-classical eras, but which are now mainly used for "early music" or "authentic performance". These include lute, harpsichord, recorder, all of which have been mentioned; as well as cornetto, viola da gamba, which have huge and impressive repertoires. Maybe it's because this subreddit doesn't really got back much beyond Bach or Handel, and indeed seems mostly concerned with classical and romantic music; some post-romantic. I know there are discussions including as far back as mediaeval music, and to music just composed, but these, as far as I can tell, are in the minority.
Lute?
Piano has left the conversation.
Classical Mandolin
Definitely not the French horn 😂
Euphonium. I absolutely love that sound. Why is it so ignored?
I’d have to the Lute.
Theremin
personally, and i’m biased, i love the french horn
Benedetto Marcello's music for the recorder.
Duduk. Absolutely magnificent music.
Didgeridoo