Arrange your favorite classical hit for the Ricciotti ensemble and win €1500 - plus the chance to hear your arrangement performed live on NPO Klassiek!
In the autumn of 2026, the Ricciotti ensemble will tour the Netherlands with the theme ‘recycling’. During Ricciotti's Recycle Tour, we aim to raise awareness about re-use and sustainability. Fortunately, the re-use of materials is receiving increasing attention across many sectors. Recycling has been in music a natural part of the creative process for centuries. Think of themes and variations, rondo form, the use of samples in electronic music, or the recurring use of the Dies Irae motif. And of course: arrangements, the most direct form of musical ‘upcycling’.
Since the Ricciotti ensemble performs around 25 works on each tour, many of which were not originally written for our instrumentation, arrangements are constantly being created for us. It is therefore high time again to celebrate all (future) arrangers in the Netherlands and surroundings and highlight their indispensable role in musical life. For the seventh time, the Ricciotti ensemble is organizing an open national arranging competition—unique in the Netherlands!
The assignment
Choose your favorite piece from the 2025 classical Top 400 and create an arrangement for the Ricciotti ensemble's instrumentation that gives the piece a fresh new look. Your arrangement should be between 3 and 5 minutes in length. You are given complete artistic freedom. Bonus points will be awarded to arrangements that creatively incorporate themes such as recycling, circularity, and/or sustainability. The classical Top 400 list can be found here: https://www.npoklassiek.nl/thema/klassieke-top-400-lijst
Prizes
The three best arrangements will be included in the repertoire for our autumn tour (17–22 October 2026) and performed multiple times throughout the Netherlands during the tour.
In addition, the winners will receive the following cash prizes and will be eligible for the Audience Award .
– 1st Prize: €1500
- 2nd Prize: €1000
- 3rd prize €750
A new feature of this edition of Ricciotti's Arranging Competition is Ricciotti's Radio Prize. Before the finals, one arrangement will be selected for performance during an episode of the Radio 4 program Vrij Spel on NPO Klassiek.
Please note: If you wish to be eligible for Ricciotti's Radio Prize, make sure the original work is in the public domain.
Finals and prize ceremony
The final will take place on the evening of Sunday, 18 October 2026, at the Verhalenhuis in Haarlem.
Deadline
Download here in the registration form and email it together with your arrangement in PDF and MP3 no later than Tuesday 8 September 2026 to info@ricciotti.nl.
Judging Criteria
All anonymized PDFs of the arrangements are reviewed by a three-person jury. During the review attention is paid to:
- Suitability for the Ricciotti ensemble and its audiences (read here about us)
- Originality
- Composition technique (formal qualities)
- Orchestration (effectiveness)
- Harmonization
- Layout and presentation
- Notation and articulation
Instrumentation
2 flutes (of which possibly 1 piccolo)
2 oboes
2 clarinets (in B flat major)
2 alto saxophones (in E flat major)
2 bassoons
2 horns (in F minor)
2 trumpets (in B flat major)
1 trombone
2 percussionists (including 1 drummer and 1 classical percussionist)
8 1st violins , 6 2nd violins, 5 violas, 4 cellos, 3 double basses (of which 1 possibly amplified double bass or bass guitar)
3 contrabassen (waarvan 1 eventueel versterkte contrabas of basgitaar)
Percussion: drum kit, 3 tunable rototoms (for timpani parts), glockenspiel, bongos, cymbals a2, tam-tam and small percussion (triangle/woodblocks/tambourine/etc.)
Range of the Rototoms:
We look forward to receiving all registrations! Do you have any questions? Send them to info@ricciotti.nl
