Entering into the Christmas spirit? We definitely are right here at BBC Music Journal.
And some of the joyous issues you are able to do throughout the festive season is to get family and friends across the piano for a very good previous Christmas singalong.
Listed below are among the greatest Christmas carols and songs you can accompany on the piano with out the necessity for concert-level piano abilities. We have additionally linked to the lyrics of many of those great festive melodies.
You will discover lots extra lyrics to your favorite Christmas carols right here.
What are the most effective and best Christmas songs to play on the piano?
1. ‘Jingle Bells’
You are most likely very aware of this festive basic: however do you know its origins? The music was created by American composer James Lord Pierpont, as a Thanksgiving music in 1857. It is now a favorite the world ever, cropping up in purchasing centres, on doorsteps, at kids’s carol concert events and far more.
We named ‘Jingle Bells’ one of many greatest Christmas songs ever and one of many greatest Christmas songs for youngsters.
Listed below are the lyrics to ‘Jingle Bells’. And this is a simple piano tutorial:
2. ‘We Want You a Merry Christmas’
Not like ‘Jingle Bells’ above, ‘We Want You a Merry Christmas’ has steadfastly British origins. Composed within the West Nation within the sixteenth century, it needed to wait greater than three centuries for its second within the (winter) solar.
The music was popularised by Arthur Warrell (1883-1939), a composer and conductor who organized the tune for his group of madrigal singers at Bristol College. It obtained a primary public efficiency throughout a live performance again in December 1935.
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The excellent news right here is that ‘We Want You a Merry Christmas’ is sweet and straightforward to study on the piano, with its easy verse-chorus construction. You may discover numerous simple tutorials on YouTube. In the meantime, elsewhere on our website you will discover the lyrics to ‘We Want You a Merry Christmas’.
3. ‘(I am Dreaming of a) White Christmas’
Written by Irving Berlin for the 1942 musical movie Vacation Inn, ‘White Christmas’ is filled with nostalgia for the Christmases all of us really feel we bear in mind from childhood – snowclad, jolly, echoing with the sound of sleigh bells ringing and youngsters singing.
The truth that it additionally holds the Guinness World Document for the best-selling single of all time is a surefire marker of the music’s everlasting reputation.
The lyrics are an exquisite feast of heat nostalgia: however the music performs its half too, oscillating because it does between main and minor keys.
4. ‘The 12 Days of Christmas’
With its many memory-testing rounds and its charming imagery of French hens, calling birds, geese a-laying and extra, ‘The 12 Days of Christmas’ is a perennial Christmas basic. It might have began out as a kids’s reminiscence recreation – and certainly, it takes some focus to sing your approach precisely via the 12 rounds. Simple on the Christmas punch when you sing this one!
‘The 12 Days Of Christmas’ was first printed in England in 1780, though it wasn’t paired with the tune we all know so effectively at the moment till 1909. That was when English composer Frederic Austin co-opted a conventional people tune to function the musical accompaniment to these pleasant lyrics.
Sure, it does have quite a lot of verses – however what enjoyable they’re! And really, the melody itself is pretty easy, with simply three predominant chords. This is a hyperlink to an simple piano tutorial on YouTube – you’ll find more durable ones on there too, if you wish to take issues up a degree.
In case you want reminding of the lyrics to ‘The 12 Days of Christmas’, we’ve after all obtained you lined.
5. ‘Silent Evening’
This much-loved Christmas carol was composed and carried out on Christmas Eve 1818 in Austria.
Some 40 years later, ‘Silent Evening’ was translated into English, courtesy of a Miss Emily Elliott. It then grew quickly in reputation in each Britain and Austria/Germany. A lot so, the truth is, that in Christmas 1914, within the first months of World Warfare I, each the German and British armies sang it within the trenches.
We would suggest Kyle Coughlin’s association of ‘Silent Evening’, with simply the three chords of C Main, F Main and G Main.
And as soon as once more, our complete assortment of Christmas carol lyrics consists of the lyrics to ‘Silent Evening’.
6. ‘O Christmas Tree’
The fir tree has come to be the archetypal Christmas tree – and this historical German Christmas music has performed a key position on this affiliation. The German unique is named ‘O Tannenbaum’ – a phrase meaning ‘fir tree’ in addition to, for a lot of centuries now, ‘Christmas tree’.
The primary recognized model of the lyrics to ‘O Christmas Tree’ dates proper again to 1550. The shape during which we all know it now, nonetheless, originated in 1824. The composer was one Ernst Anschütz, an organist and trainer primarily based in Leipzig, town the place Bach had lived and labored centuries earlier than.
Enjoyable truth: ‘O Christmas Tree’ is the official State Hymn of the American state of Maryland.
Listed below are the lyrics to ‘O Christmas Tree’.
7. Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy
This can be a distinctive entry into our greatest Christmas piano music survey, as it isn’t a stand-alone piece of music however is taken from a ballet.
That ballet, after all, is Tchaikovsky’s much-loved Christmas ballet The Nutcracker. That is most likely the best-loved of the Russian composer’s numerous ballets (a formidable physique of labor that additionally consists of Romeo & Juliet and Sleeping Magnificence). In america particularly, The Nutcracker is an absolute festive fixture, and the ‘Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy’ is a required ingredient of any winter piano efficiency.
To correctly render the unique’s unforgettable ‘musical field’ high quality, you need to play this one quietly. Sluggish and sleek, like a ballerina, can also be the way in which to go.
8. ‘Away in a Manger’
A perennial kids’s favorite, this much-loved Christmas carol could be very simple to play on the piano. Simply eight notes are concerned, they usually can all performed on the suitable hand.
Listed below are the lyrics to ‘Away in a Manger’, to go round amongst your younger choir!
9. ‘Hark! the Herald Angels Sing’
A surefire entry into our listing of the 25 greatest Christmas carols of all time, ‘Hark! the Herald Angels Sing’ options an uplifting musical setting by none aside from Felix Mendelssohn. The lyrics themselves are older: they date from 1739, the truth is, when the well-known Methodist preacher Charles Wesley wrote a Christmas hymn that started ‘Hark! how all of the welkin rings, Glory to the King of Kings’. That was the primary kind of what’s now Hark! The Herald Angels Sing.
And what an uplifting piece of music it’s too, whether or not sung to the heavens in a cathedral on Christmas Eve or round a piano with family and friends. Listed below are the lyrics to ‘Hark! the Herald Angels Sing’ so that you can sing together with.
10. ‘Strolling within the Air’
And let’s finish with one thing really particular.
It was a big a part of what made the animated movie The Snowman so unforgettable. Sure, the magical ‘Strolling within the Air’, composed by Howard Blake, hardly ever fails to carry listeners spellbound. You may nearly really feel the frosty moonlit air round you as you hear.
The movie model has a wonderful piano association, with vocals from choir boy Peter Auty. Later, the music was launched as a success single by Aled Jones.
The excellent news is that ‘Strolling within the Air’ is as simple to play as it’s magical.
