How to Arrange Music for Marching Bands
While there are plenty of resources available for buying pre-arranged music for your marching band, nothing quite matches the thrill and challenge of developing your own arrangement. Only you know which instruments you have to work with, the strengths and weaknesses of your band, the occasion for which you'll be performing and the mood you are trying to set. By tailoring the arrangement to suit your particular needs, you can deliver a crowd-pleasing show that is unmistakably yours.
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Instructions
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Design a Show for Your Marching Band
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Decide how many songs your show will feature and the order in which they'll be performed.
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Choose opening and finale songs that create the feeling with which you want to start and end your show.
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Determine how long you want each song to be. Songs for marching bands are generally 2.5 minutes at most, with the longest song toward the beginning and the shortest song as the closer.
Arrange Each Song in Your Marching Band's Show
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Choose the key for the song you want to arrange. Flat keys generally work better for marching bands than sharp keys, unless you are going for an especially bright sound.
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Assign the instruments that will play the melody throughout the song.
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Transpose the melody into the key required for each of the various parts. Most composers arrange their songs for concert C instruments, such as piano or guitar. But marching bands incorporate numerous B flat and E flat instruments, for example. The melody must be stepped up or down to accommodate these parts.
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Add harmonizations and assign them to various instruments, reserving full three-part harmonies for the most exciting parts of the song.
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Use creative doublings to change the timbre and dynamics of the piece. You can also alter the key and tempo to build toward the song's climax.
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Consider composing your own counter line, which serves as opposition to the melody, to create tension at various points in the song.
Score the Song
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Write the score using a computer scoring program such as Finale.
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Write the melody all the way through, without accompaniment.
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Add the bass line and accompaniment parts, along with any counter lines you may have developed.
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Finally, create doublings where desired. Specialized computer scoring software may help with this, as it allows you to copy and paste sections of music and makes it easy to transpose between instruments in different keys.
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Tips & Warnings
Consider the occasion and audience of your show carefully before you begin. Determining the mood for your show will help you choose appropriate songs and decide on their order in the lineup.
Pick up a copy of "The Complete Marching Band Resource Manual: Techniques and Materials for Teaching, Drill Design, and Music Arranging," by Wayne Bailey and Thomas Caneva, at Amazon (see Resource below).
Obtain permission from the publisher before making an arrangement of any copyrighted work. An arrangement is considered a duplication, which is illegal unless the copyright holder gives permission in advance. Consult the Music Publishers' Association to locate the publisher of the work (See Resource below).
