New Year, New Start
by John Riggio
Welcome to a new year! This is a great song to kick off the calendar year, or the start of the school year. It's upbeat, positive, and encourages a can-do, do-your-best attitude. It's also incredibly infectious, and if we had our way, it would become the new worldwide anthem for New Year's Day every year – and not just for kids!
Though we're calling this an optimistic rock tune, it also has a bit of a show tune vibe to it. You can almost see the singers and dancers energetically moving on stage, can't you? Feel free to take the notion and run with it if you're able. Even if you feature one or two dancers, it could be a real showstopper!
The vocal line is mostly unison until bar 50, where there is an optional divisi. (Performers should sing the top line if they only sing one line.) The melody has some challenging rhythms with syncopation, and it goes at a decent clip, but if you have our accompaniment tracks, there is always some instrument reinforcing the melody line, whether it's piano, electric piano, French horns, or trumpets.
And speaking of our instrumentalists, we'd like to recognize our amazing studio musicians on this recording. From the rhythm players, to the orchestral players, to our singers – they all did an outstanding job! Listen especially to the bass line, masterfully played by Steve Dokken, who played the part freely and performed some pretty cool riffs throughout!
Encourage your student body, your audience, and even your community with this song. With a new start, anything is possible!
Text is taken from Music K-8 magazine.