Top of the World

I was surprised to learn that this song was originally intended only as an album cut, but when country singer Lynn Anderson's cover was a hit, the Carpenters also released it as a single.

This arrangement of the classic Carpenters feel-good tune was commissioned for a mixed quartet of three women with a male bass. This allows it to sit in a mellow tessitura for the upper parts, nurtured by the warmth of the male voice in its middle, most relaxed part of the range.