I realized when I opened the blog that I haven't posted in about 1 year, so let this by my annual post for 2017. (with baby #6 due in a few weeks, that's probably very likely to be true) :)
We held a memorial day recital this year. The first 5 songs were songs from the branches of the armed services - each child was given a lead sheet* and taught about chords and keys enough to be able to arrange the left hand. (*The youngest got a lead sheet modified into a piece for beginner - middle C hand position.)
The second set of 7 songs were duets arranged by either someone in the family - or just found online. I will give references for those along with the sheet music. (Because the online versions were often very small and hard to read as a duet, we re-typed to make them bigger.)
I'm posting our recital program with references to songs we used, photos and pdf's of the sheet music we found, arranged, or created, and videos of us performing them. I hope that someone out there looking for sheet music or ideas for your beginning performers might enjoy this post and appreciate the time I put into getting it all organized and posted.
Here is our recital program:
Below are image files of each song, and below each song is a link to the pdf version on google drive.
Three lead Sheets came from Music for Music Teachers.
The titles below will have a link for each individual song I got from that site.
The others I just googled and can't remember where I found them? (I typed them all up - even the ones I was able to find from the Music Teachers site - so that when it was time to add in my kids' arrangements, I already had the file ready in MuseScore.)
The Solos
Arranged by my 12 year old daughter
The Marine's Hymn (for beginner level)
Transposed from lead sheet to the key of G for my 7 year old daughter to be able to play.
Arranged by my 10 year old daughter
(I'm not sure where I got this lead sheet from?? So the link is to an armed forces medley lead sheet, but I'm sorry I can't give credit to the original?)
Arranged by my 10 year old daughter
Semper Paratus (Coast Guard)
(I didn't actually find a lead sheet for this one but rather made one from actual sheet music I found; I needed all 4 older children to have the opportunity to create/arrange.), so the link above is to my google drive with the lead sheet I put together.
Arranged by my 14 year old son
Now the duets!
For this part, the PDF files are linked in the title rather than below the images.
(piano/recorder)
This is the recorder only sheet. I just typed up one I found online (from Katie's recorder site) so that I could add the piano part (which I arranged).
(violin and piano)
The piano part to this is a little tricky (and I went through several different piano accompaniment arrangements, as I kept having to simplify it for my 7 year old). The violin has the melody and the piano has the harmony, and that makes it a challenge for young piano players who want to hear a song they know.
The violin part came from violinsheetmusic.org
I've listed 2 piano accompaniment versions below, the second one being the easier of the 2 (and the one we decided to use for the recital.) The link above has the score, the violin part, and the easier piano part in 3 pages. The violin original you'll have to click the link to the free violin sheet music site to access.
The "score" (for the easier piano version)
Yankee Doodle
(cello/piano)
It was small and had no words (picture above), so I re-typed it in MuseScore to add words and make it easier to read (picture below). And then my son went and added to it!
We looked up the chord markings on a guitar site, and my daughter (age 10) just added chords to the additional part my son tacked on. (One chord per measure so it was a calmer rhythm and featured the solo.)
This is the 2-page version of what the pianist played.
(To be honest, she just had the first page as shown above, the first image, with the words to Seth's added part written below and chord symbols above the words. I typed this for the sake of the blog posting, so I'm not certain if the notes listed are the exact ones she played, but those are the chords she played.)
(piano/guitar)
(I had recommended my daughter just play out of the hymnbook, but she decided it was too hard. I suggested she just play the melody and the parts of the left hand that she could. She simplified the song and typed it up in MuseScore herself.)
My husband just used the guitar chord markings and accompanied her.
(piano duet)
This one was really fun to play. I did find an arrangement online, but it was just an arrangement for a solo, so used that piece to turn it into a duet.
(I know the melody line came from whatever I found online, but I can't find the original I downloaded, so I can't remember what parts were original and what parts I made? I think I just used their left hand part to figure out the chords and then tossed it and added both the piano1 left hand and the piano2 both hands.)
(recorder/guitar)
The original recorder part came from the same as the other recorder song above - Katie's site.
We found and added guitar chords (I think my husband altered a few, but he's not here as I type this to tell me which he corrected, deleted, or added.)
Here's the original:
Here's what we typed up:
The piano part came from G Major Music Theory (I love his site), so I'll let you click on that link to take you to his site. The above link (on title) will get you the pdf on my google drive for the bells part shown below.
The bells part, I arranged to match his piano sheet music.
The part at the end got a little tricky, so the girls that played our bells simplified the second to last measure by leaving out some notes/chords. (The coloring of the bells matches "hobby lobby" bells from what I have found online. I'm not sure where exactly our bells came from since they were a gift?)
If you'd like, you can watch the entire recital (live performance broadcast on YouTube). The above videos are just the best recording (between rehearsal or recital).
I hope someone looking for patriotic songs for their young performers makes use of these! We had fun putting this together and performing. (If I missed giving someone credit, send me a message and I will fix that. Although, most of what we found we altered enough that it probably isn't stepping on toes anymore.)
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