He Poos Clouds - piano/vocal arrangement

[clara]

(Hello, first post...)

Thank you very much for the sheet music! I got most of He Poos Clouds (voice and violin thanks to live versions too) by ear (but I play it for fun, I would never try to write it down seriously, I'm not that good and I'm too lazy XD). This fanbase is amazing, thanks to you I got to play This Lamb Sells Condos and Many Lives-> 49 MP with my violin teacher!

I'm with letsplaycroquet about Song song song, it is hard . I figured some of it out by ear but it's hard XD.

[Alyssa!]

I'm seeing why you used a C Major key signature for it (what with all the CM7s), but I'm with Owen in that it makes more diatonic sense scored in e minor...it would imply that instead of shifting from I to V/ii° in the intro (or the "maybe nots"), one is switching from VI to IV. Also, all those f# accidentals would drop away (oh those incredibly sexy lydian scales), and having the Bb in ("We fool around in the surface lane" and such lines) would imply e diminished.

[heathenpoet]

Jan 3, 2010 12:35:26 GMT -5 Alyssa! said:

I'm seeing why you used a C Major key signature for it (what with all the CM7s), but I'm with Owen in that it makes more diatonic sense scored in e minor...it would imply that instead of shifting from I to V/ii° in the intro (or the "maybe nots"), one is switching from VI to IV. Also, all those f# accidentals would drop away (oh those incredibly sexy lydian scales), and having the Bb in ("We fool around in the surface lane" and such lines) would imply e diminished.

Eeek, I'm sure you're right, but having looked at the full score I still can't quite get my head around it. Because the song never sounds rooted in e-minor or G-major to me - rather constantly modulating from C to A (intro, the sequence from "I move him with my thumbs" through to the end of each verse, the "Maybe Not!" bridge). And if e diminished is implicit in those passages you mention, isn't that all the more reason why the song isn't in e-minor (as they're in passing..?).

So I haven't studied analysis since the first year of my degree (depressing five or six years ago...) - and it shows!! But this is fun .

[Alyssa!]

Jan 3, 2010 16:35:22 GMT -5 heathenpoet said:

Eeek, I'm sure you're right, but having looked at the full score I still can't quite get my head around it. Because the song never sounds rooted in e-minor or G-major to me - rather constantly modulating from C to A (intro, the sequence from "I move him with my thumbs" through to the end of each verse, the "Maybe Not!" bridge). And if e diminished is implicit in those passages you mention, isn't that all the more reason why the song isn't in e-minor (as they're in passing..?).

So I haven't studied analysis since the first year of my degree (depressing five or six years ago...) - and it shows!! But this is fun .

Oh you're totally right about those two chords! The thing is, the C is always, almost always anyway, in the form of CM7, which with imagination could either the VI of e minor OR (in lead sheet notation) e/C. The e minor makes more sense to me because (a) the vocal line never (or rarely, maybe) sounds a C, and skates across a lot of e minor scales, especially in the "move him with my thumbs" buildup, and (b) VI to IV in e makes a lot more sense than I to VI in C (when the VI in C only makes sense as a rather strange secondary dominant, while the IV in e is somewhat more acceptable despite its irregularity).

I'm not deep into analysis enough to talk about the role of those Bbs, but I can say that those chords make a whole lot more sense as implying e diminished chords than Cdom7 chords (which would resolve to a never-played F major). It's circumstantial, but again, it makes a tad more sense in e.

But still, E minor isn't exactly right, and the piece never does properly sound rooted in it; the C is always added. But on the "you lazy po"..."your homes are," you've written in a G major chord for the hands to play. The right hand on the "move him with my thumbs" part makes a lot of perfect genius sense considered against e minor, and only some sense compared to c major.

I guess all of this analysis is a bit extraneous when Owen is both a composer and a performer. As you said though, it is fun, and all thanks to the good listening you did.

[heathenpoet]

Fun indeed! I do understand where you're coming from with the key too.. it's a strange one for sure, and that's why we love it ! x

[thevan]

Thanks for the sheet music OP

[Carlo]

Thank you so much!

[suburbanmyth]

Not sure if I had this as my sheet music files are a morass of random so.. downloaded. And Thank You!!