When I'm Sixty-Four

The tempo is a little slow, and I'm not crazy about the full choir on the opening line only because the band instrumentation is sparce and features just 6 clarinets (which I like). After they play the intro, the choir comes in with guns blazing, and it's a little overwhelming. Maybe it should be a smaller section of chorus until "Will you still need me..."

Tenor saxes and bass clarinet need to get the triplet thing at the end of each chorus, the bouncy feel in the 8th notes is not always there, and the chimes part is not in the right place. Upper woodwinds need to check accidentals.

Chorus overall sounds great. Be careful on the entrance of the last verse. I like this one a lot.

Lovely Rita

You can really tell we were having a good time on this one. When Devin's voice cracked, everyone got a little fit of the giggles. I liked the use of the microphone on Devin (and Devin's work on this tune), and I love the full sound of the chorus. The solo section is getting better, but we need to really work the ending. It's tricky, but well within our grasp. A stronger entrance by the chorus on the opening "Ahh" is crucial, and we may want to consider using the women's choir, or a soloist for it.

Good Morning Good Morning

We need a more aggressive sound in our saxophones here. The overall tempo is also a little slow. The guitar solo section (played here by flutes) needs a lot of attention, and I may end up doubling this with a real guitar in performance. To the credit of the flut section, the solo sounded much better in rehearsal the week after this recording was made. For a finishing touch, we need to add our animal sounds. The rooster at the beginning, and the parade of animal sounds at the end. Dan's keyboard may come in handy.

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band Reprise

I'm happy with this. The chorus wasn't ready on the evening of our rehearsal so they didn't sing, but I'm sure it's going to rock when they are ready.

A Day In The Life

This was our last take. I think our performance can be improved by phrasing the lyrics more like John Lennon did on the original recording. It sounds very stiff here. There are places too where there are accents on some of the lyrics "Upstairs and had a smoke" for example. I also think that by opening the piece with a solo voice instead of the full chorus might allow the piece to expand more dramatically. The maracas have got to be spot on in the beginning, and I think we have resolved the last chord issue with the new chord (not appearing here).

A Day In The Life

This was our second take. We need to bring out the acoustic guitar a little more, and in the section where the ensemble has unison whole notes (the John Lennon "Ahhh..." part), we really need to crescendo. We hit it full gas too early. I'm looking forward to tweaking the big glissando together, and refining our final chord.

She's Leaving Home

The tempo may be a bit slow, and there were some key signature issues with this one. I rewrote the sax parts, but they had some missing measures at the time of this recording. We fumbled through it, and came up with a file the chorus could use for rehearsal.