I have found some inspiration for the instrumentation of Old Snow from the distant 20th century; I have decided to use the same setup as Boulez in Le marteau sans maître. Some of you may not agree with me that Boulez famous work is an "old" masterpiece (some may not even consider it a masterpiece), but I tend to think of it as a prominent work from another era as I would with a piece by Beethoven, Mozart or Liszt. (It was actually composed 1953 to 1954, with first performance 1955 and a small revision when published 1957.) I think this combination of instruments (although not quite so novel today as it was then) is very attractive. So, my idea for the instrumentation is this:

alto flute xylophone vibraphone percussion (frame drum, 2 high tom-toms, bongos (1 pair), maracas (1 pair), agago, large susp. cymbal) guitar alto (voice) viola