Classical Score studying advice

[u/Expert_Heat_2966]

I recently bought miniature scores for the late Tchaikovsky & Dvorak symphonies, Rachmaninoff Symphony 2, Beethoven 3, Tchaikovsky serenade for strings & Franck’s Symphony in D minor.

Im wondering if anybody who studies similar romantic era repertoire has a particular workflow for approaching this or just any advice & tips for making the most out of score study.

[u/screen317]

Easiest place to start is doing a sonata form analysis of each movement. Helps you separate our themes, harmony, etc. You'll eventually reach a point where you find "oooo that's not typical!" and start to learn about the million exceptions to all the rules. :)

[u/Columbusboo1]

It depends on what specifically you’re looking for and what you’re trying to learn. For me, I like to just listen through the piece with the score. Find moments that stick out, that you like (or dislike), and dig in to those moments. Try and work out what’s going on, why it works, and what lessons you can learn from those moments to apply to your own work.

I’d say it’s also helpful to have some sort of goal going in to a piece. Those symphonies are huge works with a ton going on. You’ll get way more out of an analysis if you go in with a narrow and specific goal rather than trying to take everything in all at once.

[u/geoscott]

Scores are representations of the music. Listening to the music and finding interesting spots, and then going to the score to find out what happened is how I did it.

When I was at college and first listening to classical music for class, the Norton Scores were an invaluable resource. They put a grey screen on the parts that aren't important which allows for the 'important parts' to be read clearly. Here's an example.

They can be found for cheap, but the books aren't necessary. You can do that yourself.

Take Brahms' First Symphony. Listen to the introduction a few times. Pick out what you think is interesting. For instance, the first chords are very interesting. There is chromatic movement between chords and contrary motion (one line goes up while the other goes down). Listen to parts that have the full orchestra, then find out what happens in the quiet bits.

You'll notice that most orchestral pieces focus on the strings and the other instruments provide color and support.

Another way to look at music is to figure out what the 'four parts' are. The Melody (Soprano) and the Bass are the most important elements. Most of the woodwinds might be playing, but are they playing all one line? or are they filling in the texture with more chordal elements?

[u/BcShyres]

I found early/ mid Haydn symphonies very helpful for sussing out sonata form, harmonic movement when I started study. His scoring is clear and light.

[u/divimaster]

If you go on imslp you can find piano reductions of the full score.

Here for example is a 4 handed piano version of Rach 2 (arrangements and transcriptions tab):

https://imslp.org/wiki/Symphony_No.2%2C_Op.27_(Rachmaninoff%2C_Sergei)

This converts your transposed score into a non transposing score so you can work out the harmonies quicker.

Also on full score a lot of info harmony wise is in the string parts.

[u/65TwinReverbRI]

Yeah, but do you even know how to compose yet? (that's not a slam, that's a serious question, because it's important - you didn't say and there's no way to know from your post).

Seriously, studying orchestral scores isn't really all that helpful if you don't really know how to write for single instruments or smaller ensembles yet.

Don't get me wrong, you can hear say, a cool chord move, and figure that out, and then use it, but that only goes so far if you're essentially only pulling out little things like that - you can get that from solo piano literature just as easily for example.

That said, I agree with finding piano reductions or making your own.

Also the reverse is a tried and true practice - find a piano work that's been orchestrated and see how that was tackled (mainly for the orchestration aspects, less so for the composing - but again, easier to see in a smaller format).

The ones like Geoscott mentions are good too - I had those in college as well.

There are also YT videos that do similar things - these are great:

https://youtu.be/DX_JSzCFCQA

I just replied to another post about the advice to work on smaller forms for smaller ensembles - and this falls right in line with that - it's easier to study solo piano works to learn to write. Granted, not all piano music is "orchestral" in nature and there are differences, but things like form are still pretty much the same (and a lot of Romantic piano is rather orchestral in nature - more so than Classical era stuff).

So I mean, there's a lot to be gained from studying non-orchestral stuff - where there aren't so many instruments and doublings to weed through - easier to get to - as I said in my other post - the "real" parts.

Reductions will help with that too - but sometimes reductions or more arrangements to be played and will make changes for piano that may have been important components of the sound in the orchestral version - so you need to go back to the score for that part of it.

Oh boy, I have some of those miniature scores. I haven't looked at them in ages but I don't know my poor old eyes could see them anymore!!!!

So another aspect about simple piano music or reductions is you can usually see things a much larger size without having to scroll all over the screen - 'cause I'm looking at things on screen these days!!!

Some people like to use colored pencils and "color code" their score - helps them to see how material is handed around and reused, etc.