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My amateur orchestra is doing a concert of ocean-related pieces. We don't have a terribly large wind/brass section, so we probably can't manage anything with more than a few parts of each instrument. Could I have some suggestions? String orchestra pieces are also a possibility.

Alan Hovhaness: And God Created Great Whales-for orchestra and taped whale song

It calls for standard orchestral winds, but as long as you can get a full trombone section, at least one harp, and a few percussionists, any other missing parts should work out.

{raises hand}

Uh, there's a piece I wrote a long time ago, called The Sea Bell, for string orchestra. It's had only one performance, which came to a duration of just under 7 minutes.

The Hovhaness is a great piece.

Though they probably need larger forces than you are looking for, Debussy's La Mer and Vaughan Williams' Sea Symphony immediately come to mind. Some other ideas:

Mendelssohn's Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage or even the Hebrides Overture
do some music from Korngold's score for the Sea Hawk
Sibelius' The Oceanides
Britten's Four Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes (though this might also be too large a piece)

Another idea is to look for tone poems or opera overtures that feature stories where the ocean is prominent, like say Wagner's Flying Dutchman.

A suggestion: Salieri, La tempesta di Mare. You can find
the score and the parts of this ouverture at IMSLP.

All a bit ambitious in terms of winds. We have trouble with the four horns.

One serious suggestion and one humorous one

1) Vivaldi also wrote a Tempesta di Mare -- it is a flute concerto with string accompaniment, so no other winds but the soloist are needed. It is also sometimes done with a violin playing the solo part, so in this case no winds are needed at all.

2) If you're into puns, you could add any Symphony in C.

Vivaldi's La Tempesta di Mare is also the title of his violin concerto Op. 8 No. 5 in E-flat major (right after the Four Seasons violin concertos in that Op. 8 collection).

Another orchestral piece of Final Fantasy music, this time the opening theme of Final Fantasy VII performed at Square's 'Tour de Japon'

Ocean Symphony by Anton Rubinstein (n.2) in seven mouvements, each one for each of the seven seas!!! recorded by Naxos.

Rimsky-Korsakov:

• Sadko, Op. 5
  Scheherezade, 1st movement, "The Sea and Sindbad's Ship"
  The Tale of Tsar Saltan, Introduction to Act 2, "The Tsaritsa and Her Son Afloat in the Barrel

There's also the orchestrated version of Ravel's Une Barque sur l'Ocean from Miroirs... but it does require a large brass section

That would be a really intresting concert! Here are some choices you can make.

Debussy: La Mer (I can't believe nobody has mention that yet.)
Glazunov: The Sea
Tchaikovsky: The Tempest (Its about the Shakespearian play about a ship out at sea during a storm.)

I hope that helps.

Gliere's The Sirens probably counts in a roundabout way.

Oh -- duh!

Now that I've uploaded it, here's a relevant piece for strings:

http://imslp.org/wiki/The_Sea_Bell_%28N ... Lyle_K.%29