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Piano sheet music for kids · Spiritual · Level 6: Moving on
Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho
Free beginner piano sheet music: A minor, 4/4, 16 bars. 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 spiritual about the walls of Jericho, chorus first and then a verse. It is in A minor, which has no sharps or flats in the key signature, but the tune uses G sharp, the black key just below A, in the very first bar. The chorus starts with the thumb on the A below middle C, slipping down to G sharp and back, and each “Jer-i-cho” ends on a long note made of two tied notes. The verse jumps up an octave to the A above middle C and then repeats one note, E, again and again, so keep the rhythm crisp. The left hand plays a bass note and a chord on every beat, A minor and E7.
Practice tip: Give the chorus a bounce: lean on “JOSH-ua” and “JER-i-cho”. In the verse, count carefully, because the words decide where each repeated E goes.
The words
Joshua fit the battle of Jericho, Jericho, Jericho, Joshua fit the battle of Jericho, and the walls came tumbling down. You may talk about your man of Gideon, you may talk about your man of Saul, There's none like good old Joshua at the battle of Jericho.
A short history
“Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho” is an African-American spiritual, believed to have been made up by enslaved people in the first half of the 19th century. “Fit” is an old way of saying “fought”. It was in print by 1882, when it appeared in Jubilee Songs and in a collection of revival hymns and plantation melodies.
The song tells the story from the Book of Joshua: the Israelites march around the walls of Jericho, the priests blow their ram’s horn trumpets, the people shout, and the walls fall down. For the people who first sang it, the story may also have carried a hope that the walls of slavery would one day fall.
The first recording was made by Harrod’s Jubilee Singers in the early 1920s, and Paul Robeson, Mahalia Jackson and Elvis Presley all recorded it later.
Quick facts
- Tune
- Traditional (African-American spiritual, printed 1882)
- Key
- A minor
- Time signature
- 4/4
- Length
- 16 bars
- Tempo
- Marching, crotchet = 112
- Difficulty
- Level 6: Moving on (piece 182 of 201)
- Type
- Spiritual
- 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
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