The Waltzing Cat: Concert Band Conductor Score & Parts

Anderson's gift for musical storytelling shines here: you get genuine compositional craft wrapped in delightful humor, with a dog bark that your students will remember long after the final rehearsal. The orchestration is transparent enough for Grade 3 musicians to balance and blend, yet sophisticated enough to hold a concert program with dignified company. This piece consistently draws smiles from both audiences and performers without sacrificing musicianship.

You hear a cat's unhurried confidence, the kind that comes from owning a room. The waltz moves with feline grace, all elegance and ease, until a sharp dog bark shatters the moment. It's charming without being saccharine, witty without being juvenile, a piece that invites the audience to enjoy the joke alongside the musicians.

Concert bands at the intermediate level (Grade 3) who want to program something with genuine personality and cross-generational appeal. This works equally well for student musicians building confidence in light classical repertoire and for established ensembles seeking a reliable crowd-pleaser that doesn't compromise musical integrity.

• Shape the opening melody with a light, lilting character; resist the urge to press the tempo even when the rhythm swings. The waltz should feel confident but never hurried.
• Balance the woodwind exposition carefully. The cat's 'saunter and strut' emerges from the tutti, so control dynamics and let that main theme float above the harmonic support.
• Coordinate with your percussionists on the dog bark interruption. It's a moment of pure theater; the timing and character of that interjection make or break the surprise.
• Attend to the dynamic markings in this new edition, especially the subtle shifts that create shape within sections. Anderson's humor lives partly in how he sculpts phrase endings.

Open a lighter concert program with this piece to establish an accessible, playful tone, or save it for the second half as a palate cleanser between more substantial works. Its 2:57 duration makes it an ideal encore or a strong standalone moment when programming needs buoyancy and humor without depth.

• Balancing melody and accompaniment across sections
• Playing light articulation and clean phrasing at moderate tempos
• Responding to conductor cues during interruptions and textural shifts
• Shaping a waltz rhythm with consistent lilt and character
• Coordinating ensemble entries and transitions across the full band