Music by DANIEL DORFF |
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Take the Orchestra Out to the Ballgame |
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Duration: c. 5' ORCHESTRATION: 1(Picc)111 1110 1Perc Strings QUINTET VERSION: English Horn, Trumpet, Percussion, Bass, and Piano Through musical and mood variations on "Take Me Out to the Ballgame," the narrator tells a story of your local orchestra's baseball team playing against the nearest professional team. DETAILS COMMISSIONED by the Philadelphia Orchestra for its Sound All Around series, March 2003. OTHER QUINTET PERFORMANCES include Aspen Music Festival. AVAILABLE from your favorite sheet music dealer, or direct from Presser. PREMIERE of orchestra version by Brazos Valley Symphony, January 23, 2012, Marcelo Bussiki conducting. TEACHING/CURRICULUM USE: Introduces "variations" by using a familiar theme transformed through various moods, and featuring characteristic instrumental solos on the melody. View the complete orchestra score (on the Score and Parts tab) PROGRAM NOTES In the early 2000's, I received several commissions from the Philadelphia Orchestra's education department to compose works for their "Sound All Around" series for young listeners. Led and narrated by Charlotte Blake Alston, these events featured members of the orchestra in chamber concerts, and in 2006 the selected musicians happened to be the managers of the orchestra's softball team, the Philadelphia Firebirds. (Yes, they did play against other orchestras' teams.) For many of these pieces, I started with a familiar children's song both to tell a story and to allow variations, to introduce how music can conjure moods. With that season's players, I just had to make a story about the orchestra's softball team, so I used the familiar song for theme and variations. The story's episodes lead the musicians through introducing the melody and then repeating it with stylized variations for xylophone, trumpet, string bass, English horn, and the whole ensemble. Several years later, I adapted the piece for orchestra, keeping the same featured instrumental soloists as in the original version. The narrator's script is planned for any orchestra's own baseball team to play against their local team. AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION To warm up the audience, the narrator may talk about "variations on a theme" as a familiar way to build a piece of music. The variations in this piece change mood a lot, and sometime distort the melody a lot, but it is always clear where the "1, 2, 3 Strikes You’re Out!" line is. This is a great tool in helping listeners follow each variation. The narrator may precede the piece by training the audience to yell 1, 2, 3, while successively holding up 1, 2, and 3 fingers, and then training them to make the same hand signs emphatically but quietly, without saying a word. Then tell them that in the music they’re about to hear, they’ll get to silently hold up 1, 2, 3 a lot of times. While the printed script takes place around the Philadelphia Orchestra visiting the Phillies, it is easy to adapt to any other location’s orchestra and baseball team. |  |
last updated May 9, 2026 |
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