Who writes their own horn charts?

I've been trying to add multitracked horn parts to my home-recorded originals, and I've kind of backed myself into a two-horns-in-harmony thing. What are some ideas for approaching horn parts?

more than 2 part harmony. unison parts trading melody to the horn section for parts of the song.

got a clip?

Listen to a whole bunch of latter 60 rock soul/motown/ jazz rock and get a feel for how a horn section works with a band. tons of music back then had horn parts

Or just call me lol and I will lay down the tracks ..I be a geezer that grew up playing that stuff .........rat

If you have one horn/section playing the melody, use the other to play punches or long notes. It helps a ton to write down a walkthrough of the song. Not notes and chords, but on staff paper you'll have "Sax plays melody 16 bars" and "trumpet punch" or "long notes."

1.) Get a copy of Al Green's Greatest Hits

2.) Listen to Brother Wayne Jackson (trumpet) and Brother Andrew Love (tenor) testify.

Can I get an "amen" for the mighty Memphis Horns?

AMEN!

if it's with a rock group (guitar and vocal lead), melody with punches/long notes are great, as are just punches and long tones (guitar solo, vocal melody, sommat like that)

if it's a horn-lead group, I like to have at least 3 horns, and trade the melody while the others play cool backgrounds; I'm a fan of complex rhythms, but that depends on you and the song you're doing

Hi Chicken Monkey,

I have numerous explanations and examples on my site (see my signature) of different ways to use horn sections. I hope it helps. Obviously, I do horn parts for a living!

Good luck and keep writing!

Jim

P.S. In the next revision of my site I'm going to add some more in-depth tutorials regarding horn section writing.