Year-Round Music
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Fun Popular Music
Ain’t We Got Fun
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“Ain’t We Got Fun” is a great hit from the Roaring 1920’s. Richard A. Whiting’s lively music for the lyrics of Raymond B. Egan and Gus Kahn have made this song a standard of the American Songbook. Arnold Harris has written an equally lively arrangement, focusing on the word “fun”, repeated constantly by each choral section in different ways. There is also much interplay between all the voices, adding another fun element to the arrangement for chorus members to sing and for the audience to enjoy.
Keep On The Sunny Side
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“Keep On The Sunny Side” was written in 1899 with words by Ada Blenkhorn and music by J. Howard Entwisle. It has great meaning as support for a positive outlook on life through all the struggles and problems every person encounters along the way!
The Carter Family popularized the song with their 1928 recording and it gained more fame again in 2000 in the movie “O Brother Where Art Thou?”
Arnold Harris has written a lively piano accompanied arrangement, featuring an acapella, barbershop style setting of the second verse, before returning to the original upbeat tune.
This song is perfect for any setting. Your chorus and audience will enjoy the music and the meaning.
Yes We Have No Bananas
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“Your chorus will enjoy the playful banter of “yes” or “no” in Arnold Harris’ fun arrangement of this great and well-known song from the 1920’s! This timeless standard combining Irving Cohn’s music and Frank Silver’s lyrics gains new life in Harris’ setting. There is also an opportunity for chorus members to be “jokesters” as well as a fun a cappella interlude in the middle of the piece. Chorus and audience alike will have a great time considering “Yes or no? Which is it now?”
Original Settings of Famous Poems
He Jests at Scars
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Shakespeare’s “Romeo & Juliet” is well known for its many beautiful, deep and amazing statements about love! Arnold Harris has chosen a different phrase to set, one that has deep meaning in another way. Romeo had just overheard Mercutio mocking his love for Rosaline and is thus moved to say, “He (Mercutio) jests at (my) scars who never felt a wound”, meaning that only a person who had never had their love rejected could make fun of it. This phrase could be found to have many other meanings as well in terms of relations
between people.
Arnold Harris’ setting adds “ha, ha” to the text throughout, giving the chorus the opportunity to “laugh”. The words “a wound!” are also repeated many times with extra stress. A key and meter change adds interest and depth to the arrangement. Your chorus will enjoy singing this setting and your audience brought into a deeper relationship with these powerful words by the incomparable William Shakespeare.
The Clod and the Pebble
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“The Clod & The Pebble”, is a poem from the famous English romantic poet William Blake’s (1757-1827) “Songs of Experience”. The poem is a discussion of whether love, as a humble clod of clay at the bottom of a brook states, “seeketh not itself to please, but for another gives its ease”. This contrasts with a pebble in the same brook as the clod that takes the opposite view that “love seeketh only self to please”.
The Fly
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“The Fly”, a poem from the famous English romantic poet William Blake’s (1757-1827) “Songs of Experience” focuses our thoughts on the life of a little common fly. Blake muses for example how “my thoughtless hand” has “brushed away” the fly’s summer play. Arnold Harris has mirrored the text in his a cappella SATB setting with a thoughtful section juxtaposed with a lively, dance like section accompanying Blake’s awareness that the fly, like a person, dances and drinks and sings. Changes of key and meter give extra life to this unaccompanied setting.
The Quality of Mercy
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From William Shakespeare’s play, “The Merchant of Venice”, Arnold Harris has set Portia’s famous speech, “The Quality of Mercy”.
In a flowing 5/4 meter with a slow and thoughtful tempo, Harris brings music to match the meaning of Shakespeare’s timeless words about the rewards for both the one who gives and the one who receives “mercy”.
When You Do Dance
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Dance is an important element of Shakespeare’s play “A Winter’s Tale” Arnold Harris has set Florizel’s speech to Perdita, where he urges her “to do nothing but to dance and move” and wishes her “a wave o’ th’ sea” among other wishes that she always continue to dance. The continuing dance-like rhythmic flow of the music enhances the meaning and feeling of the words.
American Folk Songs
Shenandoah
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“Shenandoah” is among the most famous traditional American folk songs. There are many versions of its origins, with some tracing as far back as the 16th century among French Canadian fur traders on the Great Lakes. It has a history as a sea shanty as well. There are also many versions of the lyrics, with most mentioning falling in love with the daughter of Chief Shenandoah of the Oneida Iroquois.
Arnold Harris Originals
The Caribbean words and music by Arnold Harris.mp3″>Arnold Harris has written both the words and music of this delightful, fun and energetic two-part arrangement.
Active lyric imagery of a moment on a beautiful Caribbean beach combines with a happy and appropriately rhythmic piano accompaniment to create a fun arrangement, great for both young as well as experienced choruses.
This is a fun opportunity for a
drummer or percussion ensemble to create an exciting rhythmic accompaniment.
Hey! What a Gorgeous Day
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Imagining all the things that are special about a “gorgeous day” gave Arnold Harris the impetus to write this engaging two-part piece. It’s certainly true that “dreams are free” and that it’s good to take some time to “lie back and see the world, spinning in a whirl!” as this moment “might not come again!”
The Wind is Like My Love’s Heart
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Arnold Harris has written both the words and music of this sweet song about the vagaries of love, comparing the ease of the wind to change from “blowing hot to cold” to the equally swift changing of “my love’s heart”. The piano accompaniment supports all the imagery of the wind and breezes flowing across fields and flowers and streams and how hard it is for the narrator in “trying to hold” love and all its vagaries.