Welcome to our yearly miniseries on the Brandenburg Concertos of J. S. Bach!  Here we jump into Brandenburg 6, delighting in the weirdness that results when Bach decides to omit violins, preferring a dark, low sound of violas, violas de gamba, cello, and violone.  This brings us to some more examples across Bach's oeuvre, as well as some others by Brahms, Bruce Broughton, and John Williams.  As any creative person knows, setting limitations for yourself -- "no violins", for example -- is actually a good strategy for stimulating creativity, and results in a more unique creative output.  How fortunate for us, then, that Bach seems to agree.

Brandenburg 6 - movement 1 - Netherlands Bach Society

Other pieces that were used as audio examples:

BWV 18 (cantata with 4 violas and no violins) - Netherlands Bach Society

BWV 80 (Ein feste burg), middle movement (unison chorale) - Netherlands Bach Society

Brahms - A German Requiem - movement 1: University of Chicago Orchestra, University Choir, Motet Choir, Members of the Rockefeller Chapel Choir, James Kallembach, conductor (recording used under Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives 3.0 license) - refer to the first entry on this IMSLP page

Other pieces that we talked about, but did not play as examples:

Bruce Broughton - score from Tombstone (1993) - Gunfight at the O. K. Corral (4 bassoons can be heard in the first minute of this scene)

John Williams - score from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001) - Hogwarts Forever (French horn quartet) (can be heard from 0:00 - 1:50)