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Piano sheet music for kids · Children's song · Level 3: Notes below middle C
Aiken Drum
Free beginner piano sheet music: C major, 2/4, 16 bars and a pickup. Press Play to hear it on a real piano, slow it down, or hear one hand at a time; click any note to start from there; print it for the music stand.
About this arrangement
The Scottish song about the man in the moon who played upon a ladle, in 2/4, with the tune from The Baby’s Bouquet (1878). Each line starts with a pickup of two quick semiquavers (sixteenth notes), and most of the tune is steady quavers (eighth notes) in C position: E, E, E, C, then F, F, F, D. In bars 7 and 15 the thumb drops to the G below middle C on “Ai-ken” and comes straight back to C for “Drum”. The chorus, from bar 9, uses crotchets and quavers for “la-dle”. The left hand plays a bass note and a chord on each beat: C, F and G7.
Practice tip: Count “one and two and” and fit the quick “There was” in just before “one”. Practise bar 7 slowly so the thumb finds the low G and gets back to C in time for “Drum”.
The words
There was a man lived in the moon, lived in the moon, lived in the moon, There was a man lived in the moon, And his name was Aiken Drum, And he played upon a ladle, a ladle, a ladle, And he played upon a ladle, And his name was Aiken Drum.
A short history
Aiken Drum is number 2571 in the Roud Folk Song Index. It is a Scottish song, first printed by James Hogg in his Jacobite Relics (1820), and the oldest versions are thought to come from a Jacobite song about the Battle of Sheriffmuir in 1715; over time it turned into a nonsense song about a man who lives in the moon and dresses in food: a hat of good cream cheese, a coat of roast beef and buttons of penny loaves.
Walter and Lucy Crane printed the tune and the nursery words in The Baby’s Bouquet (London, 1878), and it has been sung in schools ever since, often with children making up new verses about what Aiken Drum wears. The Digital Tradition has the same tune with small differences, which is normal for a song passed on by ear.
Quick facts
- Tune
- Traditional (Scottish; tune as printed in The Baby’s Bouquet, 1878)
- Key
- C major
- Time signature
- 2/4
- Length
- 16 bars and a pickup
- Tempo
- Cheerfully, crotchet = 100
- Difficulty
- Level 3: Notes below middle C (piece 63 of 201)
- Type
- Children's song
- Hands
- Both: melody in the right hand, chords in the left
- Copyright
- Public domain tune; arrangement by Digital Greenhouse, free for personal and classroom use
Questions and answers
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