Welcome to our podcast, Band BFFs. The podcast
where we make your music selection less complicated.
On today's episode, we will be discussing Upbeat
by Randall Standridge. Cheers to starting the
conversation. This piece is a blast. So cute.
It is a publisher grade 1 .5. It's about two,
two and a half minutes in length. It's really
fast. Lots of energy, lots of repeated syncopated
rhythm, massive amounts of percussion, of course.
There is a split clarinet part and split trumpet
parts. Everything else is pretty simplified except
percussion. There's an optional drum set part.
So like if you have a that can play that this
this room this is like funk to me right so fun
so a drum set would be awesome but you can also
split that out amongst lots of lots of different
players if you need to and it is not on the Texas
PML and so Laura and I both said oh my gosh this
would be so fun to do with a region band because
it's just beefy enough but also not too out of
reach so super super fun so the whole piece is
it's marked upbeat rock, it's at 144, it's in
the key of concert E flat, and it starts out
with everybody having the same rhythm. One, and,
and, and, and one. Little chromatism in there.
And then like timpani and drum set. One, and,
and, and, and one. Concert E flat, by the way,
I forgot to say that, sorry. So at the beginning,
the first time you have that little part for
everybody, the final note on measure two, downbeat
of measure two goes down. One, and, and, and.
and won. then it goes one and and and and one
and it goes up to the upper octave so the reason
I bring that up is because just for teaching
opportunities that's pretty cool you can teach
like your flutes how to play the lower C and
how to play the upper C with a good sound trumpets
same thing D with the kick slide upper D without
being out of tune things like that not everybody
goes up and down the octaves it's just flute
and trumpet but that's an excellent opportunity
to always teach how to sound good in ranges of
your instrument that you don't always go to.
As you mentioned, the drum set part. And that
unison octave, right? I mean, this whole thing
is unison. A lot, a lot of unison, yeah. So then
there's this little rim shot, little snare jump,
digga digga rim shot. And then at five, it's
so cute. It's a digga digga rim shot. Digga digga
rim shot. Lots of cymbals too, which you know
Standridge loves, so just use with caution. Yes.
So then the... drum set part kind of keeps going.
You've also got like a tambourine part like you
really do just think of like a little. It is
rock yes. At five the sax and the horn have the
melody and it's got some accents one two and
three four and one two and and and then at seven
the low people come back in with that same rhythm
one and and and one and and and one and then
they play it once alone and then at eight the
the upper people join in and play it with them.
I told Laura before we started this, we're playing
this right now with our Sweet Sub -Non -Varsity
and they love this piece because... They're like,
it's so hard. It's so fun. Cause it's the same
rhythm over and over. And they're like, but there's
a style marking on everything, right? So like
there, I mean it does, it can look a little intimidating.
The rhythm with all the eighth rest and then
the accidentals and then the style, but it comes
together so sweetly. So I, I just, I love this
piece. So you're going to hear me sing it a lot.
And I just think it's so fun. I come home from
work singing it. So it's very catchy. Um, so
then the horns and the altos. Take over again,
same little rhythm. One, two, and three, four,
and one, two, and one, and, and, and, and one.
So then everybody's got that. And then the lows
get to keep going. Two, three, four, one, two,
and one. Oh no, wait, sorry, we're not on that
part yet. So right at measure 13, the horn and
alto and second clarinet comes in with this little
almost chromatic little lock down. One, three,
four. Yeah, it's so fun. When the upper voices
get the one, two, and three, four, and one, two,
and, and. Yep, and then the lows got it again,
then everybody joins them. It sounds like something
from Sesame Street. I don't know. Do you know
what I mean? Like, teaching you a, this is the
word of the day. I don't know. Okay, well anyway.
I just showed my age. I'll take that back and
we can use that in the band hall on Monday. So,
so fun though. So continuing on, we get a, the
next little moment is with trumpet and flute
and oboe at 17. They have the same thing. One,
two, and three, four, and now we've got this
cute little chromatic thing. One and two and,
and then everybody has one and, and, and, and
one, two, three, four, and those all, all those
notes. have an accent on them when we're crescendoing
up to 21. This is the melody I was thinking it
was before. So now the trumpet, horn, and clarinet,
and sax. And percussion, by the way, is super
active all the way through this. Not only do
you have that cool drum set part, but I mean,
there's lots of cymbals. Lots of cymbals. There
is some mallet percussion stuff that's going
on. Cowbells, suspended cymbals being hit. And
cowbells are pitched cowbells. Like you want
two different pitches of cowbells. There's all
types of some serious funk percussion happening.
At 21, now we've got a new melody. One, three,
four, and. Three, four, one, three, four, and.
two three four one so it's so cute so catchy
again a great teaching piece because you do have
like inharmonic notes you get to talk about like
oh it's an f sharp in this measure but now we're
in a new measure now it's f natural um you know
all those little things that you know are great
to teaching moments yeah um There's the bass
line happening underneath that as well with percussion
just kind of keeping the groove. The melody comes
back again. And this bass line in this section
really is just like a something. A walking bass
line, yep. Then we've got everybody reaches at
28, one and two and three and off. And then 29,
everybody has the same rhythm again. It's just
like the beginning. And one, lots of percussion
in between. Yep. 33, we go back to that same
thing from before, this time with flute oboe
and clarinet one only on the melody with bells
only. And it's not accented in the same way it
was earlier. You don't have those punches on
one and three. Yeah, it's a little bit more like
calm here. The low brass are doing something
different. That's a piano, yeah. And they have
like a cool little chromatic -y thing too. Then
the horn and clarinet have a response. So they
play first, upper people. One, two, and three,
four, and one. two and and and then horn and
alto one two and three four one and two and so
now we've taken that same melody and just split
it out between two different voices um then they
we all kind of all join in together and lead
up again to 39 lows get to have one and and or
sorry one and and and and one then it's a percussion
break then everybody one and and and and one
percussion break again then a forte piano 43
the lows have the melody one and and and trumpets
add more people add and one then it's percussion
break for four measures and now it's a ds all
coda so you go back to five and you play basically
the same stuff again so the same type of roadmap
yep until measure 28 and then it goes to the
coda and the coda has really similar stuff in
it again everybody playing together. We bring
that same theme back one and and and and one
just like the beginning. Yep we've got the accented
melody again one two and three four and one two
and everybody one two three four and so it just
has this cute little ending I mean this piece
is just adorable and really easy to put together.
Because it's so repetitive. Or depending on your
group, right? That's right. Yeah. That's right.
But just a couple of basic melodies to latch
onto. And then it's about. That's right. That's
right. Then it's about layering and balance.
Exactly. And where's my ear going? Ear mapping
it out correctly for them. Letting your percussion
have some fun, but not get too crazy. And like
people are always asking, you know, Laura and
I for like advice on what should I. I program,
blah, blah, blah. Recently, somebody asked us
like, I need a piece with dotted quarter notes
in it. I need to make sure my beginners understand
this rhythm or whatever. This is a piece where
you, it's literally called upbeat. So do you
need some help with some syncopation? This is
your piece, you know? And once they get it, they'll
get it forever, you know? And they'll always
be like, oh, remember upbeat when I learned how
to play on an A and well, and I love that so
many of those trickier rhythms are unison, right?
The style is unison, the rhythm is unison, so
I mean that makes teaching it so much easier.
You could spend a week on the first four measures
if you needed to because everybody plays the
same thing. Yes, and it comes back over and over.
But like I said, it makes kids feel really successful
and they love it because it sounds harder than
it is. And with the DSL Coda, it makes it seem
longer than it is as well, which again is really
fun for... Any kid to feel successful and excited.
Yeah, it's 50 printed measures. Plus the CODA,
of course, you know, which is another, what,
20 measures or something. Oh, there you go, 62
measures. That's so fun. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we
hope you will consider programming Upbeat in
the future and thank you for joining us on this
episode of Band BFFs.