Arranging for Steelband - Part 3

In the previous two parts of this guide to arranging for the steelband, we looked at what we would need to start arranging, as well as the ranges of the pan in a small steelband, and we saw our first glimpse of an arrangement.

The Starting Point: The Leadsheet

To start off, we need the lead sheet for Begin the Beguine, available from Wikifonia. The version that we will use in this guide can be found here. Note that Wikifonia allows you to transpose the lead sheet before downloading, so I chose the key to be F, as it allows for the melody to fit well on the Tenor Pan and is also a fairly simple key signature. Download the pdf and we have a lead sheet that looks a lot like this:

First page of the lead sheet for Begin the Beguine from Wikifonia.org.

The notes given on a lead sheet are, for the most part, the melody. Above the bar are letters representing the chords. For example, in the leadsheet above, the chord for the first bar is F, the chord for the second bar is F6, etc. As mentioned in the first part of this guide, you will need to have a basic understanding of what chords are to understand what we are about to do.

Entering the melody

In MuseScore, a new file will need to be created with four instruments (we aren't going to arrange for the Double Tenors just yet). We will enter the melody into the Tenor Pan's staff. I sometimes enter the chords in there too, as it helps me to arrange the other voices without having to keep looking at the leadsheet.

Once the melody is entered (along with the chords), the first system will look something like this:

Starting off: only the melody and chords have been entered.

If you press play, you will be able to hear the melody, but it doesn't sound particularly awesome yet.

Working with the chords

Now we use the chords to work out the Double Seconds and Guitars' parts. For now we are going to use a very simple strumming rhythm. The strumming rhythm takes notes from a chord and simply plays them repeatedly to a rhythm, as shown in the second bar in the following picture:

A very simply strumming pattern.

Here two notes (F and A) are played in a simple pattern. Due to a human deficiency (two hands!) each pan can usually only play two notes simultaneously. Since chords tend to have multiple notes in them, we split the chords between the seconds and the guitars. We generally want players to be using both hands while they strum, so some duplication may occur. For example, in the following snippet both pans together play an F major chord.

F major chord shared across Double Seconds and Guitars.

Note that the notes of the chord can be allocated in other ways too, but we usually try to allocate them in a way that is comfortable for the players, and also that creates a comfortable sound on the ear. If the notes that the seconds play go too high, it could clash with the melody being played on the tenors, for example.

Using this method of allocating the notes of the chords between the pans, our first few bars of the tune will now look something like this in MuseScore:

First three bars: now with chords!

The chords have been allocated between the Double Seconds and the Guitar Pan, but remember that this is not the only way it could be done. For example, the chords could also be split up like this:

A different way of splitting the chords.

There are reasons why you might choose to arrange the chords the second way rather than the first way. First of all, it gives the different pans a lightly more interesting combination to strum. Secondly, some pans may have a bit of an unpleasant sound when playing notes a tone apart, so that can be avoided by splitting the tones across different instruments... of course this isn't something that should happen on well-tuned pans!

Adding the bass

All that's missing now is the bassline. I'm going to choose one of the easiest bass patterns for now: alternating between playing the fundamental and the fifth of the chord on each beat. You can see how this works in the following screenshot from MuseScore:

All the pans playing together.

This type of bass part is very easy to arrange, and very easy to play. In fact, it's too easy. If you have a bass player who is playing pan for the very first time, then this part is fine, but otherwise it's too boring! It also makes for something that is relatively boring on the ear. Having said that, just be aware that bass sounds tend to blur quite a bit in certain (most?) environments, so having a complicated bass line may be counterproductive.

Something to take home

Using the above method, I made a very simple arrangement of Begin the Beguine. In later posts we will change the rhythm and the parts, but for now it may be useful to see what a full arrangement looks like. For the most part, the arrangement is very simple: I've left the melody unchanged on the tenors, allocated the chords to the seconds and guitars without much creativity, and I've kept the bassline very simple (boring!). You can download the MuseScore file or the pdf. Note that I haven't created different scores for each of the pans yet, as this isn't meant to be a final arrangement for playing... having said that, it may be a start for a beginner band.

In the next part of this guide, we will take the arrangement of Begin the Beguine and modify it so that it starts to sound like something decent. This means that we will change the strumming patterns and bassline to change the style of the song, and then later we will also fiddle a bit with the melody.