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The Worlds of Gilbert and Sullivan

The Floral Dance - Words and music by Katie Moss (Founded on an old Cornish Air) . . .

The Floral Dance
(Four bars intro)

As I walked home on a Summer night,
When stars in Heaven were shining bright,
Far away from the footlight's glare,
Into the sweet and scented air
Of a quaint old Cornish town . . .

Borne from afar on the gentle breeze,
Joining the murmur of summer seas,
Distant tones of an old world dance
Played by the village band perchance,
On the calm air came floating down . . .

I thought I could hear the curious tone
Of the cornet, clarinet and big trombone;
Fiddle, 'cello, big bass drum,
Bassoon, flute and euphonium,
Far away, as in a trance . .
I heard the sound of the Floral Dance.

And soon I heard such a bustling and prancing,
And then I saw  the whole village was dancing;
In and out of the houses they came,
Old folk, young folk, all the same,
In that quaint old Cornish town . . .

Every boy took a girl round the waist,
And hurried her off in tremendous haste,
Whether they knew one another I care not,
Whether they cared at all, I know not,  . . .
But they . . . . .

This takes us to bar 37¹ SEE FOOTNOTE BELOW FOR DEVELOPING EXPLANATION . . .

kissed as they danced along . . .

And there was the band with that curious tone,
Of the cornet, clarinet and big trombone
Fiddle, 'cello, big bass drum;
Bassoon, flute and euphonium,
Each one making the most of his chance,
Altogether in the Floral Dance . . .

I felt so lonely standing there,
And I could only stand and stare,
For I had no maid with me,
Lonely I should have to be
In that quaint old Cornish town . . .

When suddenly hastening down the lane,
A figure I knew I saw quite plain;
With outstretched hands I rushed along
And carried her into that merry throng,
And fiddle and all went dancing down . . .

We danced to the band with that glorious tone,
Of the cornet, clarinet and big trombone
Fiddle, 'cello, big bass drum;
Bassoon, flute and euphonium,
Each one making the most of his chance,
Altogether in the Floral Dance.
Dancing here, dancing there,
Jigging, jogging everywhere,
Up and down, and round the town,
Hurrah! for the Cornish Floral Dance.

Footnote 1.   

Two invaluable visitors to our studio recently expressed an interest is seeing (hearing) how we develop these tunes. And suggested that others might also be interested. 

Well, here's one that has been sequentially developed - instead of waiting until it was finished before publishing here it was growing as we sang (listened to - and read about) it . . .

Hope we are not boring you repeating the sequence. HERE GOES.

 At the moment we are going through a sticky patch of family health problems - so it's a little slower than usual. Please stay with us  . . .

Here we are at bar 37 And an explanation of how we construct the song . . .

First we add a solo line for say four bars
 We've used a French Horn as our primary instrument. . .
Next we've doubled up the solo with a soprano sax to give the tone we desire.
Now we've varied the dynamics of the 37 - 41 to fit in with our interpretation of the words.
We've added a top strings section, brightened in 38-39 with piccolo; and added a brass section in 40
Can you hear their enthusiasm? . . .
Do you get the idea? Hope we're not killing you off with technicalities!!!

Small delay while we catch up with other important tasks . . .

Now is the time for us to add a bass line
We are using a set of strings to simulate cellos and basses which fractionally slower - smoothes the music nicely.
To these we've added a double bass line, brightened a section with woodwind, added some drums in the martial bar 40 and we are approaching the sound we desire to fit the words . . .

kissed as they danced along . . .

And there was the band with that curious tone,
Of the . . .

Again we add a solo line for say four bars
 using a French Horn as our primary instrument
doubling up the solo with a Soprano Sax . . . You get the idea? Boring? Not on your life . . .
Looking at the vocal score, and the piano accompaniment for these four bars, 
there appears to be a lot of

Buts let's fill in a little background:-

We are using Microsoft FrontPage within Windows XP for designing the web pages (an old package) - we love it.
We are then using Evolution Audio to arrange the music (another old package) - we love that too
So we arrange the music in Eva as .sng files, then convert to .mid files for inserting into the web.

There is of course a few years experience learning these packages from rather technical handbooks.

The Eva software contains some 127 sounds to choose from - 
all midi sounds which means they are digital recordings of real instruments.
These can be altered in pitch and velocity without any noticeable distortion!
Eva also has a drum kit containing some 81 percussion sounds recorded in the same way.

So the grouping of these various sounds can make a formidable combination.

The pictures on the pages - photos and clipart - are processed in Microsoft Publisher and Paint Shop Pro; two other excellent software packages which we have learned to use and love over the years.

Hope this all makes some sort of sense

On we go . . .

cornet, clarinet and big trombone
Fiddle, 'cello, big bass drum;
Bassoon, flute and euphonium,
Each one making the most of his chance,

Now for the top strings and brass; 
and, oh! dear, who auditioned that trombonist . . .?
And fill in the bass line (and some strange percussion effects)
so that we get a closer feel of the Band with the Curious Tone
Before we leave bars 40-44 we can see some lovely long notes (minims) in the piano accompaniment which just call out for some further orchestral treatment so we have set them as a high horn sector which brightens up this section. Sorry to be still tweaking but that is what the fun is all about - hope you approve!

Altogether in the Floral Dance . . .

We are now entering a crucial change in mood so the music needs to change its sound to match the words.
Here is an initial sortie into the transition. We are taking the next 8 bars(45-53) together to span the progression . . . First the solo line, then the top accompaniment . . .
And now a first shot at the bass lines . . . These will almost certainly need considerable tweaking. When we have time. Life is extremely hectic at the moment!! Be patient with us please!

Time for another small input: We've added some bass notes, refined the other sections and added some strange drum sounds. The enthusiasm of the crowd (particularly children) joining in with makeshift percussion instruments (saucepan lids, spoons, jam jars . . . etc, Anything goes!!) is marked here . .
Probably needs some more tweaking but  . . .
Yes. We have now tweaked some more, and added a persistently sonorous B flat (the root key of Katie's song) 'solemn bell' sound to bars 52 - 57. 

I felt so lonely standing there,
And I could only stand and stare,
For I had no maid with me,
Lonely I should have to be
In that quaint old Cornish town . . .

Next a subdued top strings line - brightening at bar 56, ready for some good news . . .
Painfully slow, isn't it? SORRY BUT we have a lot of additional (and seasonal) demands to meet at the moment!
Now for a bit of second strings and bass backed up with low bassoon - softly at first brightening with high piccolo in bar 56.

Now the fun begins:  The music and lyrics brighten as we go into the final section . . .
Well, we couldn't leave on a sad note on Christmas Day, could we?!!!
First the top strings, piccolo (with underlying bassoon) and the solo instruments; bringing us to bar 61 . . .

When suddenly hastening down the lane,
A figure I knew I saw quite plain;
With 

In the meantime we've gone back to reflect on some of the recent additions. We've altered the bell sounds by lifting them up an octave - more realistic?. We've added the plaintive tone of a bassoon (diminuendo) to bars 49-51. And we've added another four bars of solo and a bass line - bars 61-65 . . .

outstretched hands I rushed along
And carried her into that merry throng,
And fiddle and all went dancing down . . .

Hope this is continuing to make sense!!!

Next we've filled out the bass, added a fiddle in thirds to bar 63, and a bassoon in a lower register to back up the woodwind's low notes in the slight crescendo.

We are now approaching the end piece - and a big finale? First the solo part and a little of the top strings - backed by piccolo . . . 

We danced to the band with that curious tone,
Of the cornet, clarinet and big trombone
Fiddle, 'cello, big bass drum;
Bass-

We've been entertaining our family visitors for a few days over the New Year - back with you very soon . . .

Here we go again:  A few tweaks on the previous brass sections and upper strings, and a new brass section for bars 66 - 69. Oh No; not that trombone again. Has he lost his score or something?!!

Our latest session has been one of tidying up. We've, hopefully, repaired the bell sounds in bars 52-57, changed the oboe to  a more sombre bassoon in bars 49-51; and added bass and drums in bars 65-69. Should be sounding more like the real climax now . . .

5th January 2010 already - and we started this tune sometime in November 2009!  But we've come through the December and January periods of family illness, of the enigmatic Santa Claus, of that impostor Old Father Time, a very un-English spell of cold, snowy and icy weather (that's no excuse!) and of course the recalcitrant trombonist. 

We've done a lot more repairing and tidying up throughout the tune to overcome the shortcomings of the software (well it is rather ancient by computing standards - but we love it); tweaked (enhanced?) the fiddle solo in bar 53 and added some more solo bars 69-73. So we're in the penultimate 4 of the final 8 bars of the piece. Hope all these progressions are improvements!

-soon, flute and euphonium,
Each one making the most of his chance,
Altogether in the Floral Dance.
Dancing here, dancing there,

Next we've added some top strings, backed by piccolo, for bars 69-73. And  we've patiently tweaked a couple of irritating earlier parts - emphasising more clearly, in different ways, the two syllables of the words bassoon in bars 21-22, and merry in bar 62 (more akin to how we sing (say) these words).

At last we've come to the last four bars. But first we've added the bass parts and drums to bars 69-73. There's also been an inevitable bit more tweaking! We've also emphasised the latest bassoon part (to live up to his (her?) questionable reputation!). 

AND FINALLY, the end piece. First the solo parts - with suitable dynamics (speed, etc); this is the tricky bit. If we can get this right . . .

Jigging, jogging everywhere,
Up and down, and round the town,
Hurrah! for the Cornish Floral Dance.

Next: Some top strings, backed up by piccolo. Nearly there . . .

AND finally (we hope) here are the bass parts and percussion. Plus we've exchanged the piccolo for an instrument called a pan- flute - which is a more mellow sound and in our opinion fits in with the folksy sound we are looking for . . . That incorrigible trombone is still echoing in our ears. I think it's perhaps time to pension him (her) off . . . And are those the bells of St Michael's church in Helston we can hear fading into the background, as we leave the scene? Hope it is a ring of eight bells - please let us know if we are wrong. Incidentally we've also mended some grammatical errors in the libretto. 

I shall certainly be considering some changes to the end piece, following the big B flat major end chord, before we've finished - even scrapping it, but we'll see . . .

SO finally, finally, we've finished the song, together with a fun end piece which hopefully enhances it. We're sorry to leave this experiment - publishing work in progress. But it's been a pleasure describing the process to visitors. Hope you also have enjoyed the experience. JEA

Hope you've been able to follow our machinations . . .!!

Note: This tune is specially arranged for Lynn and her family, and in loving memory of Syd. These wonderful people (described as 'The Cornish Contingent') have been a marvellous inspiration to us over the years we have been developing the MusicSmiles website. Thanks for the many happy memories.

( Click number to view statistics > > >). Scribe thanks all our  223,547 MusicSmiles visitors up to beginning of September, 2010. 

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