bass oboe

• In the Great Museum of our Memory – for bass oboe by Brian Cherney • The East Coast – concerto for bass oboe and orchestra by Gavin Bryars • Earth Spirit – for bass oboe and orchestra by Yuang Chen • The Sacrifice of Prometheus – for bass oboe and orchestra by Marko Bajzer One of the most notable uses of the bass oboe is in Gustav Holst's The Planets, where the instrument is used to great effect and provides a tone of which no other instrument is capable. Notable solo lines include some faint parts during "Mars", during the bitonal runs by the woodwinds in "Mercury", numerous exposed lines in the quieter moments of "Saturn" (probably the best example of a solo in the whole work), and in the fifth and sixth bars of the bassoon's soli after the opening notes of "Uranus". The bass oboe is also prominently featured in the first interlude of Michael Tippett's Triple Concerto. There is also a very substantial solo in the second movement of Thomas Adès's "Asyla". Frederick Delius scored for the bass oboe in six of his works: Songs of Sunset, A Mass of Life, Requiem, An Arabesque, Fennimore and Gerda, and Dance Rhapsody No. 1; however, the latest research reveals that despite his use of this term, Delius's intended instrument was the heckelphone. Arnold Bax calls for it in his Symphony No. 1, and Havergal Brian requires an instrument in both The Gothic symphony and his Symphony No. 4, Das Siegeslied. Humphrey Searle calls for the instrument in his Third Symphony (1960). Percy Grainger includes the bass oboe in Children's March and The Warriors, which has a notable large solo for the instrument in the middle of the piece. The bass oboe solo in The Warriors and "Saturn" of The Planets are the more famous bass oboe excerpts. The bass oboe has not as yet come into its own as a solo instrument; only a few solo bass oboe concertos have been written to date, for example, The East Coast, by English composer Gavin Bryars, composed in 1994, and a 2016 Concerto by Ca-nadian composer Christopher Tyler Nickel. The former work was written for the Canadian performer Lawrence Cherney, who uses a bass oboe manufactured by F. Lorée. Two concerti have been written featuring the bass oboe in addition to the other four members of the oboe family, these works being David Stock's Oborama (bass oboe featured in the fourth movement, "Dark and Solemn") and James Stephenson's "Rituals and Dances", both written for Alex Klein. Marko Bajzer recently composed The Sacrifice of Prometheus for bass oboe and orchestra, which premiered with the Reno Philharmonic. • Illustration — From left: oboe, cor anglais, and bass oboe British oboist Michael Sluman has commissioned approximately 60 works for the bass oboe, a number of which have been performed at recitals in the UK, the 2016 Australian Double Reed Society in Sydney, and the 2018 International Double Reed Society Conference in Granada. These works consist of solo, orchestral, chamber, and recital pieces, along with a number of quartets for oboe, oboe d'amore, cor anglais, and bass oboe, written for the Asyla Oboe Quartet. Sluman has given lectures on the bass oboe at the Royal Academy of Music, London, King's College London, the University of North Texas and the Royal Northern College of Music. Robert Moran's Survivor from Darmstadt, for nine amplified bass oboes, was commissioned by oboist Nora Post and premiered in 1984. At least one sonata for bass oboe and piano, by Simon Zaleski, has been written.