Composers have often expanded the orchestra to include instruments not typically found in that setting. Ravel would add a saxophone; Holst wrote for a Euphonium; Tchaikovsky used cannons! Perhaps most unusual is Leroy Anderson’s use of a typewriter. The popular ‘Sleigh Ride’ composer casts a traditional office typewriter as a solo percussion instrument in his imaginatively titled ‘The Typewriter’. 

Without the novelty solo line, this piece would work perfectly well as a jaunty polka, but with the solo, it transcends to the level of comedy gold. If you enjoy this, why not try his arrangement of ‘Old McDonald had a Farm’…