Folk songs and spirituals for piano
Traditional tunes and the composers who set them, to read at the keyboard from level 2 to level 4: Greensleeves, the English tune of the sixteenth century also sung as What Child Is This?, The Irish Rover, the Dutch children's song Sinterklaas Kapoentje, and two African American spirituals, When the Saints Go Marching In and It's Me, O Lord. Seven Swedish folk dances, six polskas and a walking tune, come from Traditioner af Swenska Folk-Dansar, a collection printed in 1814 and 1815. Three composers' settings of folk tunes sit beside them: Beethoven's Air from Little Russia, a Ukrainian tune (Little Russia was an old name for Ukraine), Brahms's In stiller Nacht, a German folk song, and the sash dance from Bartók's Romanian Folk Dances, tunes he collected himself. Each piece has easier versions made from the score itself, starting with the melody alone.
- Pieces
- 15
- Levels
- 2 to 4
- Key signatures
- 3 flats to 2 sharps
- Length
- 16 to 68 bars
Reading a folk tune
A folk tune is made to be remembered, so it repeats itself. Most are built from four-bar phrases, and a later phrase often begins like the first. Read the first phrase carefully, then read each next one for what is the same and what changes: half the page is often a phrase you have already read. The left hand usually keeps to a few chords, so look for the bars where it changes and leave it alone in between.
The dances want a steady beat more than speed. A polska is in three, the walking tune and It's Me, O Lord in two, so count a bar aloud before you start and keep counting through the held notes. Start with the melody alone if both hands together feel busy; the easier versions are made for that.
Level 2
A tune over a simple left hand, mostly in one hand position.
Level 3
Both hands busy, the hand moves around, a sharp or flat or two.
-
Polska from Lappland
Traditional 1 sharp, 3/4, 16 bars -
Polska from Värmland
Traditional 1 flat, 3/4, 16 bars -
Romanian Folk Dance No. 2
Béla Bartók no sharps or flats, 2/4, 16 bars -
In stiller Nacht
Johannes Brahms 3 flats, 3/2, 17 bars -
When the Saints Go Marching In
Traditional 1 flat, 4/4, 18 bars -
Polska from Norrbotten
Traditional 2 flats, 3/4, 24 bars -
Polska from Dalarna
Traditional 1 flat, 3/4, 28 bars -
Greensleeves
Traditional no sharps or flats, 3/4, 33 bars -
Walking Tune from Dalarna
Traditional no sharps or flats, 2/4, 33 bars -
Polska from Hälsingland
Traditional 2 flats, 3/4, 36 bars -
The Irish Rover
Traditional no sharps or flats, 4/4, 68 bars
Level 4
Real independence between the hands and more accidentals.
Open a piece to print any of its versions free, or to play it at your MIDI keyboard with every note marked. New to reading? The level 2 sight-reading exercises are a good warm-up.