Description

This arrangement of the Pizzicati from Delibes ballet Sylvia for four bassoons was made by Frances Jones. Leo Delibes was born in Saint-Germain-du-Val in 1836 and …died in Paris in 1891. He studied at the Paris Conservatoire, where Adam was his composition teacher. He was appointed accompanist at the Theiitre Lyrique in 1853, and was organist at two different churches in succession. He later joined the Opera as accompanist and chorus maste. In 1881 he became Professor of Composition at the Conservatoire. Delibes composed many operatic works, both serious and light, incidental music, songs, a mass and a cantata, and also wrote music for a number of ballets, the best known being Coppelia, based on E.T.A. Hoffmann’s story Olympia. The music which Delibes wrote for the ballet Sylvia includes ‘Pizzicati’, a piece which will be instantly recognisable. The effect of four bassoons performing the pizzicato patterns will delight audiences, who will also enjoy conjuring up images of dancers appropriate to the ensemble. This arrangement was made by Frances Jones. Frances read music at the University of Reading, and studied the oboe with Janet Kent and Sydney Sutcliffe. While training as a peripatetic woodwind teacher, she took the opportunity to learn the other woodwind instruments, and now teaches and performs regularly on all of them. After the oboe, her principal loves are the French horn and the saxophone, and on these three instruments she gives regular solo recitals with her pianist husband Martin, besides performing with various orchestras and small ensembles. Frances is constantly on the look-out for apposite or amusing pieces to arrange for the players with whom she works: this arrangement was written for her son Daniel when he took up the bassoon in 1997. Previously published by Phylloscopus Publications Former catalogue number: PP301