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Welcome to our podcast, Band BFFs.

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The podcast where we make your music selection less complicated.

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On today's episode, we're going to be looking at Synergy March by William Owens.

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Cheers to starting the conversation!

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Synergy March is an adorable, easy, little six-note march that is great for a sub-non-varsity

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band or a beginner ensemble.

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Or even a developing non-varsity band.

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Definitely.

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It is one minute long.

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It's in the key of concert B-flat, single clarinet trumpet parts, really basic percussion

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parts, just snare bass, crash cymbal, triangle, and bells.

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So if you have a larger percussion section, you can certainly double the bells part on

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marimba or anything like that.

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But also if you have a small one, you can cut the bells part and just have snare bass.

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I mean, and crash cymbals, there is one part with crash cymbals.

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But we played this one time with two players, and the bass drum player played the crash

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cymbal part on a suspended cymbal.

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So you can do it even with very little.

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What I love about this piece, it's very blocked 2D rhythms.

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It is great.

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My favorite thing to use this as a teaching tool is phrasing.

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It has so many four bar phrases, but a half note in the middle of that phrase at the end

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of the second bar that kids want to take a breath after.

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So it's a great teaching tool for we don't breathe on bar lines.

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We want to connect those longer phrases.

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It's written so well and scored easily for you as a band director too for teaching different

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lines of music.

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There's an obvious melody line, a little harmony, and then a little bass line, and then just

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the percussion.

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So it's easy to talk about, you know, you're not as important here.

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Make sure you're softer with those developing players, which is awesome.

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I love that Mr. Owens uses a limited number of articulation markings in this.

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So there are just accents actually.

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They're just in just a couple of places where there are accents for the most part.

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That is kind of left up to you.

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And I like that the style for this eighth note wise, the eighth notes do really need to be

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crispy, right?

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But I love that like it allows you to talk about firmness of articulation on the fronts

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of the notes, but letting the clarity of the front of the note define the articulation

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in the style.

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So you don't have to worry about getting kids to put separation between the notes, which

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we like to avoid with younger players.

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Yep.

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We talk about the eighth notes are like air darts so that their air keeps going.

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That's how we teach it.

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So that way they don't like try to cut them too short or even make the quarter notes too

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short in this piece.

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Definitely.

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I do think they need to be more full value.

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So it starts off with a woodwind like flute oboe clarinet and the trumpets have the melody.

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Altos have like a little count actually Altos have a little bit of a counter melody along

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with the clarinets.

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Along with the clarinets.

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Yep.

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And so it's really pretty.

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And again, like Laura said, working on just like extending your phrases for younger players

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is very important.

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The bass line is pretty easy E flat and B flat and a few F thrown in there.

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It's a lot of one five one.

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Yep.

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And at the end of the four measure phrase, everybody has three accented quarter notes.

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So you can line that style up really well.

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And then a cute little crash cymbal on beat four, which is so fun.

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And again, like I mentioned, we only had two percussionists last time we played this in

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our third band and the kid played it on a suspended cymbal and it was fine.

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At measure five, the whole band has a marking of mezzo forte.

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So we teach the students to come down more.

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We changed when Laura and I, well, whenever I marked my parts, we changed the low brass

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part to be mezzo piano or piano.

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So they would stay out of the way because this part is trumpet melody along with the

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saxes and clarinets.

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But the trumpets are the more featured color here for sure.

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Now in the accompaniment parts here, one of the things that I found that young players

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like to do is they like to play that it has a quarter note followed by quarter rest, quarter

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note followed by quarter rest, and they like to play those really short.

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Dah.

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Dah.

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So like even marking the parts with a tenuto over that or I always use the word tone with

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my kids.

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We talk about making the note as long as it as it takes to say the word tone, tone, tone,

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so that it's a full value note and touches the rest.

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We talk about making sure that you're off on the next foot tap.

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So tap off, tap off, then don't breathe here, tap.

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And they always want to breathe there.

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They do.

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You know, two measures.

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And it's like, come on, you don't need to do that because in the very next measure, they

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have another rest on beat two.

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So they can make it.

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But marking that in their part too, like a no breath here that will help them.

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Even the trumpets, clarinets and alto sometimes like to sneak a breath there just from like

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what they're used to, but they should not breathe on the between the second and third

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measure.

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Instead, they should take a breath between eight and nine.

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And I let them breathe there because the lows have like a little one, two, three, four,

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one leading into measure nine.

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So that kind of lends itself to just letting them have a release.

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And then at nine, they continue the melody part and the horns have like the same sort

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of part as the low part.

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So making sure if you've got like a lot of horns, they're not too loud.

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And then there's a dotted half note going to beat three.

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And then there's a pickup note in the flute oboe and clarinet part.

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So that's important again for Fraser making sure that the beat three goes all the way

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to four and there's no gap in the sound.

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And like I remember when we played this, we would like record like that one measure and

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then be like, okay, listen back to yourselves.

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Is there a gap or did it stay steady the whole time?

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I think sometimes kids like hear us say it all the time, like, there's a gap there.

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There's a gap there, but then they don't believe you.

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So if you just record like one measure, how long does that take?

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Right?

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And then just play it while they're all quiet on your phone or whatever.

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And then they go, oh yeah, there is a gap there.

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And you're like, yeah, I know, I've been trying to tell you that.

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Yeah.

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The ability to give them that instant feedback like that, like it's like putting a mirror

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in front of them, right?

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For sure.

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And then, which is really, really helpful.

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This next section here at 13, the upper woodwinds takeover, this would be like what I would

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consider the closest thing to a trio in this cute little baby march.

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But the flute oboe and clarinet takeover and alto takeover here with the melody.

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And it's just a nice easy little two bar phrase where they pass off to some of the lower instruments.

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They end the little two measure phrase with a half note and then go into a rest.

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So that is one of those places you need to make sure that they go all the way to the

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rest.

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I have my students subdivide it with eighth note.

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So we go one, two, three, and four, and off so that they really get the feel of what it

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is.

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It feels way longer than they think it is.

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I remember one time on a block day, we had like a contest to see like which sections could

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like pass it the best between themselves.

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So we did like flutes passing to trumpets, were they the best ones?

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Obo's passing to French horns, you know what I'm saying?

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So you could make it fun like a fun little game.

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It's not horns because horns don't play it, but like obo's passing to trombone.

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Clarinets passing to euphoniums, you know, that's alto's passing to tuba.

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And then have the kids vote.

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Who did it best?

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Who passed these phrases?

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Because Laura's about to tell you I'm sure it goes to the lows and then highs and then

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the lows and it goes back and forth here.

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So making it be fun for your little small younger babies I think is really crucial because

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it's not hard.

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It's all quarter notes, half notes and eighth notes.

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So just giving them the tools to make it fun but yet make it as perfect as possible.

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That's right.

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And teaching them the importance of that follow through.

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I like right here also in the percussion part, it goes to the rim.

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So the snare gets something that's just a little bit different.

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It's always a lot of fun.

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And then it goes on the rim to go so cute.

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Exactly, yes.

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Yes.

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And then the lows get to have a little like response.

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So it's like a call and response section.

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Now we're back on the drums for percussion and they get the accented part, the portion.

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So we had the little trio for two measures.

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Then the lows get to have like a little response.

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Then it goes back to the highs for one measure.

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Then the lows for one measure again with the accents.

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And then everybody together.

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And those half notes at the end for both sections.

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So again, just really talking about that follow through over and over and there cannot

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be any gap in the sound here.

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We want to make sure it goes all the way from woodwinds to brass.

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And then everybody together has some moving quarter notes.

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Then we have a whole note leading all the way into 21 and the lows have a little walking

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bass line coming up.

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And then at 21 we get this cute little counter melody.

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I love this little part at 21.

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So now we have the melody in the trumpets just like it was before.

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We also have some harmony happening in some of the other instruments.

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And then the flutes and oboes get a really cute little counter melody part.

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The bells by the way does not double the flute and obo part here.

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And I love this little cute little counter melody.

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Half, half, one, two, and three, four.

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It's really, really cute.

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And again, because of the half notes, more opportunities to just think about following

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through.

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Right before this section, one thing I just want to touch on.

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The percussion, Katie mentioned the whole note leading into this new section.

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The percussion has what's almost like a roll off for leading into this next section.

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One and three and one, two, three and four.

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And so I would like have the percussion and your low voices with those quarter notes add

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that crescendo into this next measure.

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And then that will also help the whole note people have better follow through and hopefully

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not take a breath.

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Yes.

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Hopefully.

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So again, this little part's got the cute little counter melody in the upper voices,

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but everybody else is doing what they've had before.

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At 27, we all come together on half notes, except for the flute and obo who continue

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to have a little special part.

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Like a little fanfare almost.

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Yes.

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And then it finishes with everybody having three accented quarters.

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And so just making sure everybody thinks tone, tone, tone.

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A longer value, last note.

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Yes.

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But gosh, this is such a precious march.

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It is very, very playable by any level of group.

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You can make it sound really good.

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Nobody's going outside of an easy range on their instrument.

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And it's just such a great piece to pick.

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And if your students need a little bit extra challenge, it's got a wide range of tempo

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variations on it too.

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So if you need to go at like a nice 120, that's fine.

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If you want to push it more to the 136 side, you can do that as well.

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So it allows for a little bit of differentiation depending on the skill level of your group.

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We hope you will consider programming Synergy March and thank you for joining us on this

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episode of Band BFFs.