Orchestral suite

An orchestral suite is a suite of stylized dances for orchestra, either originally composed (like the four Orchestral Suites by Bach) or as a series of brief orchestral excerpts from a longer work, such as a ballet, opera, film score, or musical. Composers have frequently arranged their works into suites for concert performance. Arrangement into a suite can make the music more accessible and available to wider audience, and has greatly helped popularize the music itself, such as in Tchaikovsky's suite from "The Nutcracker", or Aaron Copland's suite from "Appalachian Spring". Orchestral suites usually consist of one or more movements in the suite. Such an example of this could be Edvard Grieg's Peer Gynt Orchestral Suites I and II, both consisting of four movements.

The Orchestral Suite in the Baroque period was typically broken into four styles of dances:AllemandeCouranteSarabandeGigue