Sam Kemp wrote:

>I'm not sure how you define a "Symphony Orchestra", but isn't there a
>piccolo in the score of Handel's "Water Music" that predates Beethoven
>5 by about 50 years (?).  [90 years: 1717 vs 1807.  -Dave]

I don't recall the name given to the instruments in the score (I'm assuming
you mean the pieces in the G major suite), but they're usually played by
soprano recorders, even in many of the modern instrument versions I've
heard.  Not that piccolos couldn't be used.  However, in one of the works
(the Sarabande?), I tend to recall that the score called for a "flauto
traverso", or something to the effect--not recorders, and a different
instrument from that specified in the other dances.

For that matter, there are Vivaldi concerti that have been performed with
solo recorders or piccolos, depending on the performers' preference.  But
the original quiz asked for "symphony orchestra", and Baroque ensembles
tend to pre-date what many people think of when they hear the term.

>And aren't there trombones in Monteverdi's "Orfeo"? Although, that said,
>the opera house orchestra has always been different to the symphony
>orchestra (e.g.  had horns way before the SO did).

Yes, though they're earlier-style trombones, i.e. sackbuts.  Mozart used
trombones in "Don Giovanni," too. So you've answered your own question-- an
ensemble to accompany operas (especially Monteverdian ones) is a somewhat
different animal from a symphony orchestra.

Bill H.