Bizet's Carmen Suite No. 1 is one of 11 classical pieces for intermediate orchestra included in Richard Young's Comprehensive String Pedagogy & Curriculum. A portion of the proceeds of sales for all CSPC music goes to support free music education at The People's Music School.

Georges Bizet’s Carmen is probably the most recognizable opera in history. To reach beyond the traditional opera audience, Bizet made two orchestral suites by extracting the most popular parts of the opera, replacing the singers with instruments. This soon opened the door to scores of arrangements and transcriptions, the most famous of which is Sarasate’s Carmen Fantasy for violin and orchestra. Today Carmen, the opera, has transcended its original boundaries to such an extent that its familiar tunes routinely turn up in television commercials, movie sound tracks, and even as the background music for Olympic figure skating programs. So it’s no surprise that Bizet’s two colorful orchestral suites have been embraced by youth orchestras throughout the world – particularly Carmen Suite #1, which is offered here.
 Conductors and teachers can use this suite to introduce their students to the original opera. If time does not allow them to listen to all of it, they should at least hear the arias that were adapted for this suite. They might also listen to Bizet’s Symphony in C, which is included in the Advanced section of CSPC.
-Richard Young

Full program notes are included with the score. There are fingerings and bowings in all the string parts of every one of CSPC's pieces. These "cooked-in" technical solutions target the particular levels of the students. They are not just pragmatic but "musical."

Please note that due to a loss of source files, the PDF files of the music have been generated from scanned copies of printed parts. While every effort has been made to produce high quality parts, the limitations of scanning will result in some degradation of print quality.