'Lida Rose'

'Lida Rose' from Sheldon Harnick's "The Music Man" is one of my all 
time favorites. It combines the infectious sound of a Barbershop 
Quartet with the 'shuffle two-step' so common of Broadway during that 
age. (1950-1965)

It was difficult to combine the proper instruments to get the right 
sound of the male voices so I settled on harmonica, viola, english 
horn and cello. For the female lead I used a violin. I don't know how 
to improve this, but since it was arranged for General MIDI (GM) you 
can play around with it until you like it.

What you'll hear here is the quartet (The Buffalo Bills) singing "Lida 
Rose, I'm home again Rose...", then Marion joining in for a short 
solo, "Dream of now, dream of then...". They are shortly combined into 
the finished piece. 

I tired to keep the orchestration in the background, but you may want 
to play with the volume and velocities of it on your own.

.jmg.