Remember fighting off the Sandman, desperately struggling to stay awake at the chance that you might catch a glimpse of Saint Nick. Every rustle or bump made you jolt from your quilted pod and race to the living room where the lit tree posed, draped in soft light. Still no Santa! It took all your energy to climb back into bed with your eyelids drawn and your body heavy. Tucked back in as best as you could with the sheets and pillows slightly disheveled, you dozed off while musical thoughts fill your groggy head. A wide, animated grin filled your face as you dreamt of chilly nights of caroling and warm, fire-lit sing-a-longs. Music has always been an integral part of the holiday season. As everyone knows, there is no better way to celebrate than with a song. Re-live your childhood memories and share your love of music this holiday season with Santa's Little Helper published by Santorella Publications. Santa's Little Helper for Viola is also written as solos or duets in accommodating keys for Violin, Cello and Bass. This best selling Santorella Publication includes a piano accompaniment CD with lyrics, so the whole family can sing along. The Piano Accompaniment book for this Stringed Instrument Edition is sold separately. Santorella's Horn Edition is also available for trumpet, clarinet, flute, alto sax and trombone../ Recueil / Alto et Piano

Brahms had already announced his ?retirement' from composition when in the spring of 1894 he played chamber music with the cellist Robert Hausmann and the clarinettist Richard Mühlfeld. This encounter apparently renewed his enthusiasm for Mühlfeld's much admired playing and inspired him to write two clarinet sonatas in the summer of the same year. It remains unclear when exactly Brahms drafted viola parts to his two sonatas. In any case the viola and clarinet versions of the works were first published by Simrock at the same time in 1895. Today there is no doubt about Brahms' authorship of the viola parts. They include important differences from the clarinet original in order to do justice to this string instrument.An important part of this edition is the extensive preface. Firstly it informs about the sonatas' origins, their compositional process, pre-publication performances, their publication history as well as early reception. Truly remarkable is the unique Performance Practice Commentary. Here the editors start from the premise that already a few decades after Brahms' death, a widening gulf developed between the composer's expectations and the performance practices of the early 20th century. On the basis of manifold sources which include memoirs by pupils and chamber music partners, treatises and essays, early instructive editions and historical recordings, the editors deal with key issues in understanding Brahms' notation. By a section-by-section analysis of rhythm and timing, dynamics and accentuation, dots and strokes, slurring and non legato, piano pedalling and overholding, piano arpeggiation and dislocation, string instrument fingering, string instrument harmonics and vibrato, the editors provide an indispensable assistance for a historically informed interpretation of the works.At the same time, the edition offers an exciting and often surprising insight into musical interpretation of the German Romantic Era in general.- A pioneering Urtext edition- With an unmarked Urtext part- With a second part including fingering and bowing based on the practices of contemporaries of Brahms- With an extensive Performance Practice Commentary- For further information on Romantic performance practice we recommend the text booklet: 'Performance Practices in Johannes Brahms' Chamber Music?, BA 9600 / Alto Et Piano

Jules Massenet was born in Montaud France May 12 1842. He was one of the best-respected French composers of his day and a member of the Academy and a professor of composition at the Paris Conservatoire. Massenet was very influential on other French composers in France. His students were also successful due to Massenet's tutelage. Though he was principally an opera composer he also wrote ballets orchestral works and several oratorios. Massenet died in Paris on August 13 1912.This is the Meditation from Massenet’s famous opera Thais and has been transcribed for solo Viola with Piano accompaniment by Alan Arnold.