Why should I do an Arranging blog?

I’ve asked myself this question over and over and it’s helped me procrastinate (procrastination is the enemy of all arrangers and composers looking down the barrel of a commission with a deadline….more on that in another blog post!) I guess I’m just hoping to impart a little knowledge, or at least some experience that I’ve gained making my way through the school of hard knocks over the last 40+ years.

I wrote my first chart in 7th grade, not sure why I thought I could do that (I couldn’t) but that didn’t stop me. I was in a group lesson class that met a couple of days a week with about 12 other 7th graders. It was an unbalanced mix of trumpets, clarinets, flutes, saxes and a smattering of low brass. One day after school I decided I would write an arrangement and bring it to class, this was in the early 1970’s and I was a big fan of the group “Chicago” (They were on the radio, they had horns!) and I also happened to have a copy of the melody to “25 or 6 to 4.”

I was in the third trumpet section (newbies) and the only thing I knew about harmony was that usually the folks playing in the 2nd trumpet section played a note a third higher than me and the folks in the rarified air of the first trumpet section played a third higher than them. So that must be it…right? So I took the melody to “25 or 6 to 4” and harmonized it in diatonic thirds…how hard could it be? I should also mention that I’d never sat in the low brass section, so I didn’t even know there was a bass clef….and transpositions …what are they? Anyway, I finished my chart and copied all the parts in treble clef, all in the same key and all in diatonic thirds up and down from the melody. I proudly strolled into the group lesson and announced to the director that I had written an arrangement and asked if we could play it, of course he said yes… I passed out the parts, handed him my “Score” and waited for him to start, and waited, and waited… he finally said, “Why don’t you come up here and conduct your own arrangement?” (He then proceeded to give me my first conducting lesson…. “Floor, Window. Window, Ceiling.”)

OK, back to the chart, what a train wreck, without a basic knowledge of harmony, clefs and transpositions, the chart was a complete disaster and I walked out of class with my tail between my legs. The director did give me some advice, and told me I needed to learn harmony, transpositions, and clefs. The next period was full band and before we started I related my experience to one of the older trumpet players and she said, “Oh yeah, you need to learn chords.” She also played the organ and just happened to have one of her “Pop Organ” books sitting there on the floor. She reached down, opened the book to the back cover, which was filled with the notes for all the major, minor, dominant and minor 7th chords along with 6th, minor 6th and major 7ths, ripped it out of the book and handed it to me! It was a start, a bit rocky, but a start. That hard lesson informed me very quickly that I had some work to do!

So, the moral of this story is: You’d like to write a chart…great, just make sure you understand a few basics, Harmony, Transpositions, Clefs…., and then there will other things to consider….what does each group of instruments or section do and do well, and what do they not do well, (another future blog topic, and one near and dear to my heart) Ranges, Tone Colors, Form, Pacing, does the audience want to hear this, (does the band really want to play this?)

There are many great books available on Music Theory, Orchestration and Arranging, plus you have your ears….use them and listen actively (another future post “Active Listening”) buy the books, study scores, listen to music find a teacher. Don’t feel like you have to start out with a whole chart, one of my early teachers had me write 12 to 16 bars of just rhythm section, just trumpets, just trombones, just saxes, trumpets and bones together…write that much and get some friends together and play it…learn from your mistakes (sometimes the best teacher!) figure out what your ear likes and doesn’t like…that will have a great deal to do with what becomes your very own writing style.

The next Blog post will be something along the lines of “What does each section of the band do?“ or “What’s my job?” Melody, Accompaniment, Bass Line, Counter Melody. Really understanding these functions and “who can do what” will help add interest and variety to your arrangements…more to follow.

Paul