Christmas Again (Arrangement)



Christmas Again

It’s here again
A special day every year
Where spirits are high
And the sky filled with light

Stroll down the lane
Sweet voices sing, do you hear
For it’s Christmas time
A time of joy!

Season’s greetings, joyous giving
Everyone a good cheer
For this is the night
He came down to Earth

Children laughing, choirs singing
All is filled with love
For this is the night
Of His birth

The sleigh bells ring
The hour of twelve is near
St. Nick’s gonna come
And grant you your Christmas wish

Afraid to blink
See every child prick his ear
To catch sight of Nick
And his red-nosed ‘deer!

Song Notes
This song was composed by Betty, who presented it during a Songcraft session. But there was only a pre-recorded bass line for her to sing along to. I thought that it was an interesting song and felt that it would a pity should the song be left like that and offered to come up with an arrangement for the song. Furthermore, it's the type of song that I would definitely not be able to come up with, so I thought it'd be cool to work with it to widen my musical horizon, haha.. At first I thought of coming up with a Broadway-style arrangement with trumpets and all that, but decided that it would be too heavy for the song. So I made a light arrangement instead (I think so, haha..). Everything is done in one day; I don't have the patience for perfection so forgive me for any 'weird' sounds you might hear, haha..

Oh yah, and this is the first time in which I have worked with a 'plus One' situation, which meant that I worked backwards. Betty sent to me a recording of her singing, and I had to build up the music around her voice. It's way more tedious than recording the music first and then singing, because everything has to be adjusted towards the voice, whereas in the other case only the voice needs to adjust to the music. Nonetheless, it is an interesting experience and I learned quite a lot. Betty said the arrangement was not bad, so at least I didn't skewer her song too much, haha.. Have a nice Christmas and holidays everyone! =)

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Can I say again how much I LURVE your "shaker" videos?! Haha.
KUDOS to the arrangement, it's really cute :D

Firdaus said...

haha, thanks B!

Ivan Chew said...

OK, song is nice.

What's nicer is the online collaborative effort. Nice work you two.