Staccato Spotlight: Community Band Writers

Community and municipal bands have been at the center of the concert band world for as long as it has existed. These are unique ensembles, known for their intergenerational membership and audience-focused repertoire. The culture of crowd-pleasing arrangements and summer entertainment remains a pillar of the community band tradition.

We asked arrangers and composers of community band music to tell us about their experiences as musicians and ArrangeMe members. Read what they had to say in this latest edition of Staccato Spotlight!

Neille Williams is an Australian composer, arranger, and writer.

Bryan Kidd is a retired Chief Arranger of The United States Navy Band.

Michael Pilley is a professional trombonist from East Sussex in England.

Chris Gorman is a retired musician and euphonium player from the United Kingdom.

What has been your greatest ArrangeMe success so far?

Neille: I've sold lots of small ensemble pieces through ArrangeMe but to sell my concert band pieces to an international market, especially the US, is incredibly exciting for me! “Charlie Found A Blue Diamond!” was recently profiled at the 2023 Association of Concert Bands Convention!

Bryan: “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch.” It’s my full-orchestra adaptation of Navy Band arranger Scott Silbert’s Ellington-styled orchestration for the United States Navy Band jazz ensemble, The Commodores. Soon to be published is an arrangement of "Out of the East" by Harry Noble.

Tredegar Town Band plays Michael Pilley’s arrangement of “Brassmen's Holiday” at a concert in 2014.

Michael: A brilliant success was having a piece of mine featured at the BBC Late Night Proms, by the amazing Tredegar Town Band, last year. It was an arrangement of "Brassmens Holiday" by Billy May's Big Phat Brass, and they played it way faster than the original, and nailed every note. I even received a round of applause at the end of the concert, which was a humbling experience.

My best-seller is an SATB arrangement of the Bon Iver tune "Heavenly Father.” A video of the tune featuring a choir with Bon Iver went viral a few years back, and a client commissioned me to write an arrangement for his school. Seeing that it was on the ArrangeMe list, I decided to publish it straight away, and it has gone on to sell 1,380 copies. I do enjoy googling my name and seeing if any new videos have been put up featuring my pieces!

Do you play in or conduct a community ensemble? How does your role as a band member inform your arranging process?

Neille: Currently, I'm writing more than I'm conducting or playing. But for many years I've conducted and played in a variety of community and school bands as well as professional wind ensembles as a clarinetist. The experience of bringing a piece of music to life as a player, as well as studying how the players around me react to the music in front of them, is a fantastic resource and learning experience as a composer. It doesn't matter how good the piece of music sounds in your head, if it's not written well or doesn’t engage the players in an exciting way, the ensemble will struggle to fulfill the music's potential. Always consider how the musicians are going to respond to the sheet music in front of them.

Michael: I don't play regularly with any community bands at the moment, but that's because I only moved into this area 3 years ago, and due to the pandemic, there weren’t many bands running! I work as a professional trombonist, so it is hard to find extra time to make weekly rehearsals, so I end up subbing for a lot of them. I have been a member of many in the past, and conducted quite a few wind, brass, and jazz bands, so I have a really good knowledge and experience of what works at that level.

Bryan: I’ve been an arranger most of my professional life, including 26 years with The United States Navy Band. Prior to joining the Navy Band, I was a high school band director, and for the last 11 years have been the Composer/Arranger-in-Residence for The American Festival Pops Orchestra. I’ve also served for several seasons as conductor for our local community band, and for 10 years had a successful after-school jazz (big band) program for kids in grades 6 through 12.

Writing for an ensemble with diverse skill levels is one of the best learning environments for a writer. Finding technical solutions that balance the strengths and limitations of the musicians often results in a more creative and artistic piece as opposed to having “the sky is the limit” opportunities. As one of my colleagues pointed out, Mozart had restrictions and he did pretty well.

“Writing for an ensemble with diverse skill levels is one of the best learning environments for a writer.”

— Bryan Kidd

What methods have you found useful in getting your music in front of an ensemble?

Bryan: Once you have some writing experience (in my case, it was writing for the high school groups I taught and bands I played in), introduce yourself and ask. Even after I was in the Navy Band I did just that: I introduced myself to the then-leader of the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra, Buddy Morrow, and gave him a chart. A couple months later I was writing for them.

Neille: Don't be afraid to raise your voice as a composer if you already play in an ensemble. Many conductors and musical directors are interested to hear what extra talents may lay amongst the ranks of their players! You have much more to gain than lose by speaking up about the pieces you've written that you'd love your ensemble to play—so let yourself be heard! If you don't play a wind instrument, make friends with people who do! Your musician friends can advocate for you and help promote your work to the ensembles they are playing with. Go to concerts, introduce yourself to the players and conductors, let them know what you can offer them, and (some may balk at this but I do think it's a good strategy) don't be afraid to give them a piece for free to show them how excellent you are and the quality of your work. They will remember this and goodwill often flows both ways!

Michael: Mostly my arrangements have been commissions, so that's always an easy answer. I did a weekly band challenge in 2018 when I was housesitting full-time, where I visited a new band every week. It was challenging scheduling this, but I managed to get a few bands to play some pieces I'd brought along, as well as it being a good excuse to get my trombone out.

What is your advice to arrangers and composers who want to write for community band?

Michael: Sit in on as many different bands as you can, read the scores, and play your instrument. It can be easy to think that our music notation software will be able to give us a good idea of what our piece will sound like, but nothing beats actually hearing it, or hearing something similar, so you can take away what works with you. Also: If in doubt, make it easier for your musicians!

Neille: Understand that community bands often feature inexperienced or less confident players, but see this as a creative challenge rather than a limitation. Get familiar with the grade-appropriate ranges of all instruments and their technical challenges and write with this in mind. Great lower-level pieces form the building blocks of satisfying community band experiences, a thirst for bigger musical challenges, an incentive to practice and perform more, and the wonderful life-long journey that is being a bandie. Go write some awesomely fun, wonderful pieces that make your band players love what they do and want to keep playing.

Bryan: Don’t try to perfect what you’ve just written… move on to the next piece.

British Brass Bands: The original community band!

In the United Kingdom, village and factory brass band was one of the the earliest forms of the modern concert band.

We heard from many ArrangeMe members who arrange for British Brass Band and we want you to meet Chris Gorman, who reminds us what ArrangeMe is all about!

Chris: I have been arranging music since I was in my early twenties. I was taught to play euphonium at eleven years old, and by age sixteen, I became the solo euphonium player with the local village band. In my early career, I began to take an interest in arranging for brass bands by laboriously writing everything out by hand (no software available in those days). I arranged several pieces of music but none were published due to the fact that I really didn't have the knowledge of publishing. As the years moved on and the internet became available, I rekindled my arranging skills and to date have more than 80 arrangements published through ArrangeMe.

Some of the brass band arrangements I’m most proud of are “Golden Eye” from the James Bond film, and “The Puss Suite” from Puss in Boots.

I think the secret of arranging is to write in the key that the original compositions were composed in. Keep the arrangement simple, don’t let it get “overcooked!”