Macbeth Reduced Orchestration
Macbeth (1865 version)
Giuseppe Verdi
Reduced Orchestration: 1(picc)1(cor)11 1100 11111 stgs harp(optional) timps/perc
Flute/Piccolo, Oboe/Cor Anglais, Clarinet (A/B-flat), Bassoon, Horn, Trumpet, Harp (optional), Timps/Percussion, Violin I, Violin II, Viola, Cello, Double Bass
This reduced orchestration of Verdi’s Macbeth is aimed for performance using 12 or more players. The string parts can be performed with a single string quintet or with a larger string section.
The Timpani and Percussion is arranged for 1 player – a second player could be added if required. Verdi’s original harp part is included and is optional.
The score and parts have bar numbers and Ricordi rehearsal numbers.
This reduced orchestration was created during 2023/2024 and received its first performance by Mid Wales Opera on 2 March 2024 as part of MWO’s tour across Wales and the Wales/England border.
Conducted with swashbuckling verve by its music director Jonathan Lyness, who’d also prepared the 12-piece touring orchestration. It’s amazingly effective: without a full score, you wouldn’t have noticed anything missing.”
Lyness’s effective reduction of the orchestral score was played by twelve members of Ensemble Cymru, and conducted with his usual, unfussy control.”
Verdi’s conjuring of the supernatural and the diabolical in this score was effectively realised by Ensemble Cymru, with conductor Lyness – whose reduced orchestration this was – bringing an urgency to the intimations of mania.”
How was it possible for an orchestra-pit ensemble, just 12-strong, to conjure much of Verdi’s lush orchestration? Under conductor Jonathan Lyness the resident chamber orchestra, Ensemble Cymru, achieved this miracle – the timpanist also playing the side-drum, and their splendid cellist generating a rich, resonant sound in those dark moments of the drama.”
For more information or to hire this reduced orchestration of Macbeth, please contact us.