Christmas Carols from Poland
My newest collection of Christmas music will be available soon!
- for beginners (anyone in their first or second year of learning to play, or around grade 1 and 2)
- all carols are suitable for both lever and pedal harps (and the one that I am going to play today will also work on a non-lever harp tuned in C, like the 20 string Adventurer harp)
- the music will be sold as downloadable PDF (no delivery cost, and instant access to the collection)
- collection will be released in mid-November
About today’s carol
- Lulajże Jezuniu – can be translated as “Lullay little Jesu”
- one of over 500 Polish Carols, unique and not known anywhere else
- a lullaby for baby Jesus
- a musical quote of this carol was used by Frédéric Chopin in his Scherzo no 1 in B minor – check it out!
- a word of warning: it’s hard not to cry when you hear it!
Lulajże Jezuniu
You can listen to this piece in the recording from 5’00”.
How to practise this arrangement?
- start with hands separately.
- when playing the right hand – make sure you are very confident about the placing.
- for the left hand – I suggest you try to use the fingering I have written in. If you stick to using your 3rd finger for the fifths, and 2nd finger for smaller intervals, your fingers will be more aware of the change in shapes.
- it is possible to play this piece with only 3 fingers. If you are at the very early stages of learning and are only using two fingers, your teacher can help you with adjusting the fingering to suit your skill level.
- bar 7: if you need to, it is possible to slightly alter this bar to make it easier (you have my – arranger’s – permission! 😉). You can either:
(1) skip the last note of the left hand and keep playing 1-2-1, or:
(2) play the last note of the left hand with your right hand second finger, and then play the first note of the right hand in the next bar with the right hand thumb.
How to make the fingerings more reliable?
Practise using fingers:
– 1 and 2 for intervals of fourth and below,
– 1 and 3 for intervals of fifth and sixth, and
– 1 and 4 for intervals of seventh, octaves and more.
Practise different intervals by playing them as chords, then playing 1-2-1-2, 1-3-13, etc, hands separately and together.
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