Review


Maurice Ravel
Mother Goose: Five Children's Pieces

Arranged by Ralph Sauer

Trombone and piano.

Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Publisher: Cherry Classics Music
Date of Publication: 2020
URL: http://www.cherryclassics.com

Score and solo part.

Primary Genre: Solo Tenor Trombone - with piano

This is an excellent transcription of Ravel’s wonderful score. Sauer has transcribed the entire twenty minute suite without cuts.

1. Pavane of the Sleeping Beauty
2. Little Tom Thumb
3. Laideronnete, Empress of the Pagodas
4. The Conversations of Beauty and the Beast
5. The Fairy Garden

The transcription is well-adapted to the trombone. Most of the original solo wind or violin lines have been given to solo trombone and provide trombonists a chance to play Ravel’s beautiful melodies. It also provides an opportunity to display the soft lyric capabilities of the trombone and to work on the challenges created by soft sustained playing in the upper register. The piece uses the entire range of the trombone judiciously floating to e-flat2 in the Tom Thumb movement and down to E during the transcription of the humorous contrabassoon solo from The Conversations of the Beauty and the Beast. Sauer also adds a mute to the bird calls in Tom Thumb to give them a distinctive color. The biggest technical challenge is the Empress of the Pagodas movement displaying the rapid sixteenth note passages from the oboe line in the original. The passages are difficult but sit on the instrument well, certainly playable by advanced, college level players. The transcription requires excellent musicianship and could be performed as a whole or as individual movements to accommodate different levels of performers.

Reviewer: Timothy Howe
Review Published June 24, 2023