I’m prepping this show now, so just a few comments for reed players who have the privilege of playing this orchestration in the future: This is a very heavy clarinet book and was probably orchestrated with a clarinet main in mind. By my estimate the book is about 65% clarinet, 20% flute, 15% soprano sax. The amount of piccolo is negligible – it sums to probably less than two minutes of picc playing throughout the show. The flute parts are fairly straightforward, decent doubling chops will carry you just fine. Same with the soprano sax parts. The clarinet parts make the vast majority of the technically demanding music in the show, including one ludicrous Klezmer passage in the extreme altissimo that goes all the way up to a written C7.
Added based on this comment by Tom Kmiecik.
Updated to reflect the “9-piece version” available from MTI, based on this comment by Tony Moran.
I’m prepping this show now, so just a few comments for reed players who have the privilege of playing this orchestration in the future: This is a very heavy clarinet book and was probably orchestrated with a clarinet main in mind. By my estimate the book is about 65% clarinet, 20% flute, 15% soprano sax. The amount of piccolo is negligible – it sums to probably less than two minutes of picc playing throughout the show. The flute parts are fairly straightforward, decent doubling chops will carry you just fine. Same with the soprano sax parts. The clarinet parts make the vast majority of the technically demanding music in the show, including one ludicrous Klezmer passage in the extreme altissimo that goes all the way up to a written C7.