Small Marching Band Arranging: The Opening Hit

[@karlgiese6100]

what we came for: writing music what we actually got: campfire turorial

[@ChristianPaulson-Music]

We usually pay extra for that.

[@colejackson711]

Adding a drumline break right before the repeated motif at the end would definitely sell this

[@TylerDunphy]

boy did I need this video. I couldn't find ANYTHING good on youtube for arranging for marching band, as I'm just a percussionist with a minimal understanding of the workings of wind instruments (all I've amounted to is a Bb concert scale on a trumpet and a clarinet). I feel like this helped me have some guidelines of how to write and expand upon ideas, thank you so much!

[@michaelwcotten]

I'm glad you were able to get something out of this that helped!

[@zesh.3906]

same here, I loved the pieces we played in band and always wanted to learn how to make my own, just found this channel and it's so insightful!

[@brythkaltaris]

its a fellow percussionist suffering the same thing i did

[@calebalderete1]

Fellow Percussionist and arranger here myself, the thing I did was purchase instruments to learn them and understand them when it comes to composing 😂 I have a Flute, 3 Clarinets, 1 Marching French Horn, and 2 Trombones

[@Username5930-m7s]

Bro I have the same problem but I have no knowledge of any percussion

[@mattsypek]

I hope you keep making more of these! I've done a fair share of arranging and I learned a lot from this! I really like your approach to going from skeleton to finished orchestration! Side note, I programmed "A Child's Dream of a Star" with my band last spring and they loved it!

[@TylerDunphy]

lol this is an arrangement of the lick

[@iceborg05]

Wait a minute-

[@jeppoo1]

11:00

[@michaelwcotten]

Basically

[@jerm2614]

ever listened to a marching band?

[@kalechips5972]

You are a complete godsend

[@TomEyeTheSFMguy]

Finally, a good music writing tutorial.

[@tubabily]

This content is very useful to me. Keep doing Wait to see EP:2 😊

[@louannlasher3748]

Where the hell were you when I first started teaching? Oh yeah, no internet in those days. Dinosaurs. Keep up the good work. Very well presented. Even the campfire analogy took me back to teaching girl scouts 30 years ago. Ha!

[@brunomonteferrante.]

is it possible to get get the full sheet? also the drumline? thanks, great job!

[@matthewsaxman1028]

A thought, from a frequent marching band arranger - that fast D# to C# motion for the alto sax in m. 10 will be difficult for a young player, especially in terms of getting all nine fingers down at the same time and back up again one triplet eighth note later, and again two beats later in the same measure. And then having three young players do it flawlessly in unison. Sax players' pinky dexterity is generally much lower than clarinets, or especially flutes. One thing that grinds my gears in commercially published arrangements is when a piece is arranged at a solid 1.5-2 level throughout, but then has a random difficulty spike for one or two instruments up to like 4 level for a bar or two. Even occasionally from the biggest names in band arranging. I'm left thinking, "how did the editor allow this?!" The difficulty is at the perfect level for my students, but then there's one bar they totally struggle over. Sometime I just rewrite that bar. Just one of those things I guess, but it's the first thing I thought of when I saw that measure in your arrangement.

[@flyinpanda6960]

No, you can still play c# even with the bottom fingers down

[@henrylongworth]

as a saxophone player i completely disagree. it is very easy to switch between a d# to a c# quickly. most young players that i have seen can perform much more difficult maneuvers.

[@henrylongworth]

@@flyinpanda6960 yes, but the intonation will sound awful.

[@lildennys3756]

Please continue to make these. This is absolutely amazing! As surprising as it is, there are virtually zero resources outside of written text that teach marching band arrangement. Keep it up!!!

[@ARZiehm]

Anyone watching this video would be able to tell you're very experienced and knowledgeable just by how you deliver the information - Great stuff! Very educational and pedagogical.

[@sleepcircuit]

this metaphor is crazy. i love this

[@allanpaullabus2688]

Wow its great thanks for the video i learn a lot from you.. please continue making videos about marching band arrangement.. thanks godbless

[@reidmoto]

Wow, you're a total Badass with the arranging and harmony! I've taken four semesters of traditional harmony and took private lesson to help me expand my chord choices and it was a big help. So understood most of what you were doing, but I would not be able to do it. It was so interesting and fun to watch and your finished piece sounded awesome. Nice touch using the manuscript paper that was yellowing on the sides hahaha!

[@koshumu]

Didn't see that Tinder joke coming haha. Great vid, you saved me. Thank you very much!

[@Alex-mf3jj]

I'm trying to expand from just writing drumline cadences and this is super helpful!

[@cartoonpower0]

dude, this has helped me so much, thank you!

[@solaribass2491]

Could you make a video on how to write the closer? I'm really struggling with that part and you did an amazing job with this video.

[@MamaSymphonia]

Not joking when I say even just the first two minutes of this are very helpful! I'm trying to write some virtual marching band music with VSTs, and coming from an orchestral background it's surprisingly hard to get that "band" sound.

[@DeanoJones]

I teach showstyle band and this was still very useful! 🔥🔥🔥 Good stuff!

[@benjamindaniels796]

Make more of these videos please!

[@jakebaker1051]

3:30 the lick returns

[@xaviercross3285]

Thanks found this helpful. Also the band director chose the licccc

[@TomEyeTheSFMguy]

Do you think you could do a big band arranging tutorial, please?

[@Lpwyse]

So incredibly helpful! Thank you!

[@TheStickCollector]

Useful for my potential new small band

[@music_is_life95]

Great arrangement I’m a music major as well very inspiring to keep going

[@NonTwinBrothers]

Cool!

[@simonacosta7728]

I'm currently a freshman and in marching band. I've been spending my time in quarantine to start a piece of music to hopefully finish by senior year so my marching band can play it. I have lots of time and I need to start somewhere and this video was great help. I was wondering if you could make a video on writing melodies, which is something I struggle with?

[@michaelwcotten]

Hey, so I think the best thing you can do right now is to actually work with other peoples melodies. If we are looking at marching band a great exercises is this: Take a simple melody like Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star and write a 1 minute arrangement of it. Figure out what you want that one minute arrangement to do. Maybe 1) feature an instrument soloist or group, have a build up into a hit, then material to go out of that hit. It will make you work on using the material in novel ways, force you to structure your song and not just start on measure 1 then write (which is not advised despite how tempting it is), and also internalize what makes the melody great. For concert composition a great exercises is to study a work you really like and write your own melody that sounds like something that composer would have written. I would take basic piano waltzs or a basic Tchaikovsky melody and write a piece following the same harmonic pattern (the same chords) but with my own melodies and counter melodies. You have so many great examples out there of good melody, learn from them! You gotta learn to play the game before you start writing your own rules.

[@MoldyMan]

This is so helpful! Thank you so much! Please make more if you can :)))

[@JohnSamuelJackson]

Hey Michael Cotten, I'm a young composer(14-year-old Freshman) and I want to try to compose a little marching show for my HS marching band(Colonial Heights Marching Colonials, roughly 58 marchers for the 2019 season). Can you make a video about medium/large marching band composing for winds and composing for the front ensemble w/ the winds?? I'm fairly new to front ensemble composing and a little tutorial will really help expand my ideas and thoughts about the lonely people at the front of the field. I really want to make my band director proud and show him a Freshman can do a music major's work without a music degree!

[@michaelwcotten]

In general I would follow a lot of the same principles of writing for a small group and the expand on them. Think of it is this is setting the core set of ideas of how to arrange, then as you add more playing members you can add more guiding principles. A toy car and a Monster truck both have axles, both have wheels, both have the same shape, one can just do way more. Get what I'm saying? While I have been terrible about uploading, I actually am working on planning out a serious that during this Corona shut down and the summer I can start releasing on a more regular schedule.

[@JohnSamuelJackson]

@@michaelwcotten I understand. So I basically write for a small band, but I add more to it? Like longer and sustaining chords and/or more complex rhythms? Thank you! I look forward to watching your future uploads.

[@Casokat]

I really wanna learn music theory. Seems fun.

[@luisfranciscosoto]

Very nice!

[@randyknisely8979]

I am inspired to try hand in it, for years I've thought of arranging pieces that would work for any instrumentation due to a larger decline in the size of the ensemble, any coments?

[@michaelwcotten]

@@randyknisely8979 there is a wealth of “flex arrangements” that have been coming out since COVID in 2020. It really shined a light on the need for such a thing. I would search on KZbin/ JW Pepper for Flex Arrangements and study the Flex version alongside the original version and see what decision the composer made. To me, that would be the best place to start to learn.

[@relic8636]

Am i able to use this for my own marching show for next year?

[@kingkalonga1311]

it is so good thanks

[@mfachiichi6747]

I need your guidance on how I will orchestra for band sir

[@alostpickle4867]

Does anyone know what he used to write the music, like is it a website or?

[@michaelwcotten]

I used finale running Noteperformer for the sounds. The percussion was Ableton using EastWesr sound library. But I do that pretty rarely. A great, cheap option MuseScore which I definitely recommend.

[@Amphoobian-bs2me]

Bro made the lick into an opener

[@janiabmusic]

Please tell me this is an actual show I love it😭😭

[@vidyasagar9169]

👌 exsalent sir. put basic rules of arranging mucic sir thank you

[@erniebiggs8343]

thanx

[@Amphoobian]

I know it's been a while but can you please do a tutorial on ballads

[@michaelwcotten]

I really do need to make a few more videos. A closing that I did based off the Phantom Firebird closing that I did for a college band would be a good video but so would talking about a few ballad tropes. There are definitely some things I could talk about on that. Maybe I need to do a few this coming year.

[@Amphoobian]

@@michaelwcotten awesome possum

[@nathangivens4696]

wait its just the lick? always has been

[@TheStickCollector]

Will there be a part 2?

[@JesseHargrove-xq7js]

WHY ARE YOU LIKE THE ONLY ONE WHO HAS DONE THIS? DO COMPOSERS KEEP SECRETS OR SOMETHING?

[@jaimepminor80]

Wow

[@gastringer]

Could you tell me what sound plugin you use for your wind instruments?

[@michaelwcotten]

Hello, for this video specifically I used Note Performer 3 as my audio plugin in Finale. The percussion were all from the EastWest Composer Cloud collection.

[@benjaminmahan7423]

Bro I would literally give anything for a continuation video

[@michaelwcotten]

Yeah I need to get on that. I have ideas for a closer video, a ballad video, and a love letter to Jay Bocook. I really need to get on that.

[@lorddorogoth]

no licking allowed in band

[@BRG23]

What app is this I need it for my band

[@nickwright4538]

What sound software do you use that makes it sound more realistic?

[@michaelwcotten]

Hello, thank you for watching. I currently use Finale running Note Performer 3 for the wind sounds. For percussion I use Ableton Live with a combination of the East West and Native Instrument Kontakt libraries for percussion. Panning and adjusting volumes in Finale goes a long way in added realism. My next video will actually have a side by side comparison of midi and an actual recording.

[@MrTrompwn]

The lick

[@tenzorex]

WHY IS THE MOTIF THE LICCC IM ROLLING

[@chair547]

why is it the lick

[@Tuba_Travis]

Is that tHe LicC??

[@iceborg05]

1:07 i dont know of any alto saxophones that can hit a low g lmao

[@michaelwcotten]

There’s an error or two on that page

[@bradleysampson8230]

Some good ideas here. The countermelody line in m. 2 doesn't work very well, as it is just a decoration of the main melodic idea there. It's awkward for the countermelody to pass in and out of unison and close proximity of the main melody line on the concert A and concert F. The 9th of the Gm chord would work much better in m. 3 if you had a 5th in that chord. A 9th is really a 5th of the 5th and the chord would sound better with the 5th there. The F# in m. 11 really needs to sustain into the downbeat. Even if it's executed well, it's going to sound like they just died off before the final impact. If you put a rest on beat 4 of m. 9 for the instruments playing the countermelody, they should easily be able to make it for two bars without a breath and then stagger breathe for the rest of the impact. This is somewhat of a personal preference, but from my study of wind band literature I think the tied 8th note to indicate playing to a certain beat is on its way out. It makes it impossible to notate an and count release, if you ever wanted to do that, and it reinforces the idea that notes don't really need to be held for their full value. I think you'd be much better off just writing the rhythms you want played and then including a performance note if needed for the director to understand that notes need to be held for the printed durations.

[@jdaughters]

Bradley Sampson, I disagree with much of this. Must keep in mind that when writing for 20 kids, there are things one must do that aren’t completely ideal in a perfect situation, which is the premise of this video. Michael, nice job with this!!!!

[@bradleysampson8230]

Having taught and written for small marching bands, there are certain considerations that will help them be successful, and I’ve outlined those in my comment above. The main idea is that you need to make the harmony very clear, and my comment gives a few practical ways to clarify the harmony, specifically to help small bands.

[@jdaughters]

Bradley Sampson, looking forward to seeing and hearing your work!

[@roses2155]

Arranging or composing? Orchestrating when limited ranges are necessary is easier if you're also composing the music, rather than honoring the melodic, harmonic, or voice-leadings that define a given work. Take "For Good" from Wicked as an example. The modulation in the middle of the piece goes down a major third. An arranger needs to figure out how to get that relationship accessible to the scholastic marching band. F to Db? Probably not. Bb to Gb, definitely not. Your best bet is C to Ab. I don't mean to take away from this presentation; it's excellent as a compositional effort. But it's not really arranging. it's composing.

[@michaelwcotten]

I agree. The difference between mediocre and good arrangers is many things, but one of them is their ability to compose within the arrangement. A great mentor of mine once said an arrangement needs to bring something new to the table. If all it does is make you want to listen to the original source work, it didn’t do a good job. So you have to find out how to bring new life to it. It’s becoming more common nowadays for marching band arrangers to have directors add “… and original music by [arrangers name]” at the end of the source music list for announcements of the show.

[@zacharycahill3483]

Bro arranged the lick for 16 minutes