Before I draw my final conclusions of this research, I would like to briefly talk about what this research and my process during it has done to my own writing style.
Through working with Ed Partyka and Martin Fondse as my composition teachers, I was already highly sensitized to including vocals in my own music (with it actually starting with me writing big band pieces with a vocal voice added, just so I could also be included in the big band weeks at school where we featured new compositions ;-) ).
But as you can also see in my bibliography, where I also added my own scores, I have been writing music for bigger ensembles together with vocals for over six years now. The first big band composition with my voice added to it I wrote in 2015, and since then I've been writing for these kinds of ensembles the most.
With my master recital in Switzerland two years ago, I wrote for multiple vocalists for the first time, after having performed Martin Fondse's music in Lucerne with the HSLU Big Band and multiple singers.
With my master recital soon approaching at the Royal Conservatoire in June, I have already been writing on some new music for it. This time, I will be working with a "jazz orchestra". Again, there will be four vocalists, but this time a full string section (having learned from my mistakes the last time, when one string on one of each voice was definitely not enough to auditively cut through the mix), more classical woodwinds like oboe, english horn, flutes and bassoon, as well as a "compressed" horn section of a big band (2 trumpets, 3 trombones, 3 saxophone, 1 clarinet). There will also be a french horn. Added to that are of course a traditional rhythm section but also 2 classical percussionists. In total, we'll be around 42 people! I am finally finishing my dream of writing a whole concert just about exoplanets (these are planets outside of our solar system). I have been workshopping this idea for a long time now (over four years I believe!), and finally, I have the feeling that I know enough about composition, arranging, myself as a vocalist and the actual exoplanets themselves, to make this dream happen.
This season, I also had the pleasure of working with the Metropole Orkest as an arranger in its Composers Academy. Through my coaches (Damiano Pascarelli and Jochen Neuffer) as well as masterclasses with people like Jules Buckley, I have gained immense insight into non-classical orchestral composing and arranging. My work with the Metropole Orkest of course also inspired me to actually go for it and have a small orchestra as my final recital this year. My arrangements for Metropole are of course more "commercial" in a sense that I for example arranged pieces for Metropole and Altın Gün, a turkish-dutch psychedelic rock band, who play old anatolian folk music in their style.
But the combination of my research at school and these valuable lessons I am gaining from the experience with Metropole have really gotten me on a safe and exciting track towards my recital.
When it comes to what I have been writing for myself, I have tried pushing myself out of my own comfort zone as a performer when writing the music for my recital. Talking about coming out of my comfort zone, or writing out of my comfort zone, the first thing I think of is range. For quite some time, I was very self-concious about my vocal range and technique, which now, through the help of my teacher here, has gotten a bit better. I am discovering how to build up my range, especially into the higher ranges, and I am very much enjoying writing for this as well. So in Example 1, I want to showcase this new type of writing, that will push me out of my comfort zone in rhythm, range and breath-control. So I wrote the theme of my new piece "Interlocked" in a quite open arrangement, with a lot of space (to hear the voice) and as a single voice itself, joined by bass clarinet and trombone.
As this is going to be recital for the finishing of my Vocal Jazz studies, I wanted to make sure, that I also wrote "enough" for vocals. In my last recital, I did not have to worry wbout this too much, as I was finishing a composition degree. In Example 2 I really like how I integrated the voice section as the main melody, with some important lines doubled (for example that small bar in the french horn with Voice 2), yet still almost the full orchestra being in the background.
In hindsight, I mostly realized, that I already did a lot of things before I started my research like I would do them now, maybe because I am also a singer and was sensible to this kind of writing from the start. Sometimes reading a non-vocalists' lines written for vocalists can be a very tricky situation, where there sometimes is little written intent for the vocalist in question.
Now, I am definitely writing with much more intent and less intuition, placing every note with care and trying to hear everything already fully formed (vowels, consonants and all that jazz) in my arrangements before I end my writing and arranging process, but especially before rehearsals start. I can remember vividly, how me and the other three vocalists in my band in Switzerland spent so many minutes in rehearsals just figuring out when to sing what vowel or on which beat exactly to place an ending consonant for example.
My imagination to form clear ideas has gotten much more detailed through learning so deeply about the voice and its role in the wolrd of big bands and large ensembles today.