Rhapsody on Anglo-American Ballad Tunes Musings on a Thin, Erasable Line: Composing vs. Arranging

I have spent as much time as an arranger and editor as I have as a composer over the past (roughly) five decades, if not more—and have wound up equally obscure in all three fields. Part of the reason why this is so, especially regarding arranging, is purely practical: many performance situations require music tailored to a very specific situation. Most of the time, that required tailoring results in something that isn't widely marketable.

So: this will be the first, probably, of many musings, semi-rants, and occasional behind-the-scenes posts on this other creative process.

I think I have always viewed composing and arranging as two sides of the same coin: the only difference is whether the material to be worked over is one’s own or someone else’s.

Having said that: a distinction should be made between the brand of arranging that is really transcription—changing a given piece’s instrumentation or adding or subtracting parts; as opposed to working with only a melody line, sometimes a harmonization (& sometimes not), and fashioning a whole new musical environment for said melody. These are two completely different approaches requiring completely different skill sets.

Shuttling back and forth between these two fields has led me to wonder, at times: if a piece prominently quotes or utilizes preëxisting material, is that piece automatically an arrangement? Or is it an original composition that happens to use preëxisting material? Please feel free to weigh in and discuss!

Herewith a piece that, I believe, falls into this category and poses the question: my Rhapsody on Anglo-American Ballad Tunes, a work for 11 solo strings (or string orchestra) and piano (covering what, someday, will be wind and harp parts). It uses two different tunes to which the Old English ballad “Barbara Allen” may be sung, and its influences and models are threefold:

One was Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Five Variants on “Dives and Lazarus” for large string orchestra and harp—one of my all-time favorite orchestral works. Here is one of a number of excellent performances; I would rather have you see an actual performance video than hear a commercial recording with nothing but a slide for a visual.

Another was a less well-known rhapsody for oboe and strings: Wayne Barlow's The Winter's Past. Watch and listen here.

The third was Art Garfunkel’s achingly beautiful rendition of “Barbara Allen” (to one of the tunes used here) from his solo album Breaking Away. The Rhapsody itself is based on an earlier choral piece that had a not-so-terrific text, reworked into its present instrumental form.

The performance on Soundcloud.com is the world premiere; and so far, the only performance, anywhere, ever. The track has additional information posted which I won’t repeat here, except I must thank the late Gregg Smith (1931–2016) for programming it at his Adirondack Festival of American Music in Saranac Lake, NY in 1995. You may listen here.