Someone to Watch Over Me

Hi all!

So, another little arrangement of mine. I have written this for my quartet. And, I found it quite challenging to get the dissonance I wanted while really only having three non-melody voices to work with. I sort of went the amoeba route, where I had close harmony surrounding the melody. This is found in barbershop music, and there is some influence there. However, I tend to take things further than a barbershop quartet would allow, which I'm super chill with.

Pay no heed to the difficulty of the music, as the people singing this are true musical paragons. It is probably one of the harder arrangements of this piece out there.

I'm looking specifically for comments on musical moments that stick out to you. Things that you think may not be effective or fit in the narrative of the piece. Please also look out for spots where you think there should be courtesy accidentals. I put a lot in, but I suspect there are more I'm missing.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts. 🙂

What's the difference between the dotted 8th + 16th and the swung eighth notes? You say to take liberty, but more liberty is given if you just leave it swung.
The rhythm in the beginning in the reduction doesn't match the singer.
In your score: "quietude breathiness": that's two nouns together, which doesn't scan.
In general (and I don't know how the original is), the homophony holds back the work rhythmically. I'm missing some internal syncopations that might otherwise preserve a sense of motion, especially if it's from barbershop style. For occasional apex effect, it's great and you do use it that way sometimes, but in places like mm. 42-46 it really slows down (and not in the tempo way, as you want it). 
It's also not that hard... individually, at least.

The original is notated with the dotted 8th/16th. And, there is no swinging in the original. The swings are written out as 8ths/16ths and then the main chorus actually has no swing to it. But, I added the swing as it's common practice to do so. I'm still debating on what to do. Maybe I'll re-engrave it with all eighths.

The reduction change was intentional (to show the original rhythm). But, thanks for bringing it to my attention.

 I'll shift that to quietude and breathiness. It was a typo. thx!

I had thought about the homophony issue. Mostly I wanted this arrangement to be about the crunchy harmony. And with only four people, I decided to focus on one thing. I might do some finagling with the mm. 42-46 section because it does get slogging. I may also add some movement during the half note holds at the end of every phrase. Thank you for bringing it to my attention. It's good that somebody noticed it. lol.

The tuning actually is quite difficult. Tho, I consider myself a very adept vocal writer, and even if I say something is difficult, I don't intend for it to be a problem.