Many composers, alive or dead, find it difficult or impossible to get their orchestral works performed by today’s symphony orchestras. The financial burden that most orchestras bear encourages a reluctance to perform unknown or little-known compositions, even if such works deserve to be heard. Orchestral managements greatly prefer to program popular symphonies and concertos which are guaranteed to attract a strong audience. New works that are performed tend to be short, written by young, living composers, and usually given in the first half of a concert, thus allowing a popular symphony in the second half to be the main draw.

David Stanhope

Hiring a professional orchestra to record anything is very expensive and beyond the means of most composers. However, there now exists an excellent alternative for bringing neglected works to public attention. There is no technical difference in making a digital recording of a full orchestra and one that separates the ensemble into its component parts – single instruments, unison instruments or string sections (such as several violins at once). The individual sounds can then be put together using powerful computer hardware and sophisticated software. The recording...