Time Is My Friend: SSA Choral Octavo

Leavitt's arrangement transforms a pop song into something genuinely singable for SSA voices while preserving the emotional core that makes the song meaningful at graduation. The six-page score stays lean and focused, avoiding the bloat that can plague pop arrangements, so your singers stay engaged with the text and melody rather than battling unnecessary complexity.

Optimistic and reflective. The arrangement carries forward the original's contemporary feel while the SSA voicing gives it a lighter, more youthful quality. It's the kind of piece that sounds effortless once prepared but carries real weight when you hear those voices blend on the text.

SSA choirs preparing graduation ceremonies, celebration concerts, or end-of-year programs. This works equally well for high school singers and adult community choirs looking for contemporary material with emotional resonance.

• Establish the rhythmic pocket early in rehearsals. Pop repertoire lives in its groove, so drilling the rhythmic relationships between your sections locks the arrangement together faster than focusing solely on pitch.
• Balance the alto line carefully against the soprano melody. Because pop arrangements often ask altos to carry supporting harmony rather than countermelody, make sure they feel their musical purpose and aren't simply shadowing the sopranos.
• Shape the text naturally. Graduation repertoire invites vocal warmth, so encourage your singers to communicate the lyrical content with genuine expression rather than treating this as a technical exercise.

Pair this with other contemporary arrangements or art song to show range in your graduation concert programming. It also works beautifully as a closer for a spring concert where you want to end on an introspective but forward-looking note.

• Reading rhythmic patterns common to pop and contemporary music
• Balancing harmonic independence while maintaining blend in SSA voicing
• Shaping lyrical phrasing beyond classical vocal technique
• Listening across three parts to maintain ensemble cohesion in a homophonic texture