Little Lucas

Note from the composer: Little Lucas is dedicated to my 2 year-old son. It is a happy medium swinger that captures his mischievous nature with the deceptively difficult movement of major 7th chords in the A sections. The melody notes are, for the most part, the 7th of each chord and these notes follow a diminished scale sequence--going up a half-step and then down a major third repetitively. The B section features a 2 five sequence that moves in major thirds. Originally, I wrote this tune for a quartet date. For this arrangement I added a line played by the bass and piano at the end of each A section and voiced out the horns in open drop 2 voicings for a clear and cheery sound.