Home › Tools › Piano Sheet Music for Kids › I Saw Three Ships
Piano sheet music for kids · Carol · Level 3: Notes below middle C
I Saw Three Ships
Free beginner piano sheet music: C major, 6/8, 8 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
A bright English carol in 6/8, two big beats in each bar, with a long-short skip, a crotchet then a quaver (eighth note), all the way through. It starts on a pickup, “I”, on the G below middle C; after that the hand sits in C position with the thumb on middle C, reaching up to G and dipping down to B and G again at the end of bar 4. Bars 5 to 7 repeat bars 1 to 3 until the last beat, where three quavers carry “Day in the” before the long “morn-ing”. The left hand plays a bass note and a chord, or two chords, in each bar.
Practice tip: Tap the rhythm on your knee first: “I saw three ships” is long-short, long-short. Play the pickup G with the thumb, then move the hand up so the thumb lands on middle C for “saw”.
The words
I saw three ships come sailing in on Christmas Day, on Christmas Day, I saw three ships come sailing in on Christmas Day in the morning.
A short history
I Saw Three Ships is number 700 in the Roud Folk Song Index. The earliest printed words come from the 17th century, and the antiquarian William Sandys printed the version most people know in Christmas Carols, Ancient and Modern in 1833. Singers used many different tunes for it, and in the early 1930s the American collector James Madison Carpenter recorded several versions from traditional singers, a number of them in Cornwall.
Bethlehem is nowhere near the sea, and nobody knows why the carol has ships in it. One suggestion is the ships said to have carried the relics of the three wise men to Cologne Cathedral in the 12th century, but that is only a guess.
The tune arranged here is the one in most carol books today, a lively dance in 6/8.
Quick facts
- Tune
- Traditional (English; words printed by William Sandys, 1833)
- Key
- C major
- Time signature
- 6/8
- Length
- 8 bars and a pickup
- Tempo
- Brightly, dotted crotchet = 72
- Difficulty
- Level 3: Notes below middle C (piece 84 of 201)
- Type
- Carol
- 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
What key is I Saw Three Ships in?
How long is it?
Is I Saw Three Ships out of copyright?
What is the hardest part?
Can I print it?
← More christmas carols · All 201 pieces: piano sheet music for kids
🔒 Runs entirely in your browser: nothing is uploaded and no account is needed. Once loaded, the page and the piano keep working offline.