The Snowman Theme:
Walking In the Air
This sparkling piano arrangement of the main musical theme from The Snowman will win your students' hearts and imaginations with its beauty. Just in time before the snow starts falling!
It sounds harder than it is
There are a lot of notes, continually, in the left hand... have a listen to me playing on my studio piano (only a couple muffed notes!):
Only page one appears in the video, as this is COPYRIGHTED music, available at Sheetmusicplus.com.
So why is it here on my web page? Because I and my daughter are the arrangers of this piece!
SheetMusicPlus now welcomes independent arrangers
Sheetmusicplus.com has a new program going, inviting composers and arrangers to submit their pieces for publication. They have acquired the rights to almost 2 million music compositions which are not in the public domain (as of October 2019).
Very cool... I'm excited to submit a number of arrangements that I can't have here on my site otherwise!
Any technical issues playing this piece?
So what about the piece itself? What are the primary difficulties?
First off, look at that left hand. Your student must have a hand-span of an octave to play this easily.
It starts off as a "broken chord stretch", a technique I explain on my Mary Had a Little Lamb page.
But then on the way back down, finger 3 takes the place of finger 2, enabling the hand to reach VERY HIGH up to the 10th - a G ten steps higher than the root of the E minor chord.
Make them master the fingering
This fingering takes lots of practice! But it is a beautiful chord pattern that your students can make their own. It is used all through page one, then on page two, simpler broken chords replace them.
On page 3, above, things seem to wind down, with a return to the broken chord pattern of page 1 again.
Back to the beginning, up an octave
Then, the music repeats all the way back to the beginning, with right hand playing an octave higher for a bit, until the "loco" at the top of page 2 (not shown here).
I tell my students that "loco" means to go back to the ordinary LOCATION of those notes, coming away from the 8va...
Four times, right hand crosses over and hits a low D. That's FUN. Listen for it on the piano video at the top of the page.
On page 2 (not shown), there is a VERY LOW D - it booms, reminiscent of the splashing tail of the whale in The Snowman video.
The excitement of the video
Watch that part of the movie, below:
Broken chord inversions - very tricky
There is another difficult spot, at the very end of the piece, and also just before the repeat on page 3. Long E minor broken chords alternate, from root position to an inverted position, several times.
Very pretty, but your student may need preparation both mentally and "geographically" to "see" the chords that are happening.
I play the chords all with one hand, but they could EASILY BE SHARED, LIKE THIS:
Check out this lovely piece The Snowman Theme: Walking In the Air at Sheetmusicplus - your students (and their parents!) will be enthralled!
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All the first-year material I give my beginner students.
Piano keyboard sheets, scales, chords, note-reading exercises, and over 256 pages of music!
This beautiful song book for piano & voice "Esther, For Such a Time as This", available as a digital download, tells the riveting story of the time when Jews in ancient Persia faced a foe named Haman, and how a brave young queen risked her life to save her people.
A good choice for a singing story-teller, an operatic group, a short theater production, or a class of children!
This book is also available from Amazon as a paperback.
This book is available as a digital download from this site. Visit this page to see some free examples from the book.
It is also available from Amazon as a paperback!
This is the perfect easy start for little pianists.
And when they start reading white-key notes on the staff, this is a fun easy resource to say each week, "Choose a new black-key song at home this week and figure it out to show me next lesson!" They will be spending more time at the piano.
A perfect read aloud storybook
for little boys or girls.
The Adventures of Tonsta highlight the travels of a very young boy with a good heart, who goes about helping folk in trouble.
With a red cap on his head and a sack of tools slung over his shoulder, Tonsta seems to meet people in distress wherever he goes.
Lots of trolls in this book - including one who gives him a Christmas gift!
Audrey:
I just wanted to tell you that I have found your website EXTREMELY helpful!
I have a young group of children that I have started a youth choir with and I was searching for music ideas and I came across your website. THANK YOU SO MUCH!!
Bidur Kumar:
Thanks a lot for building such a nice site where people can easily find and free download sheet music for beginners. I am going to start teaching piano to kids.
I was just searching for some basic interesting songs for my pupil. Here, I found a wonderful site where I spent more than 3 hours and downloaded some music. Thanks again for making my day easier.
Becky:
A thousand thanks for your beginning piano and guitar songs.
I've already printed several for my children, including the Pretty Little Horses TAB and Carol of the Bells for piano. What a wonderful resource!
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About the Author
Hi, I'm Dana! (Say that like "Anna".) I'm the owner of Music-for-Music-Teachers.com, and a newer site, SingTheBibleStory.com.
Like some of you, I've been playing the piano since early childhood, and have added a few other instruments along the way, plus an interest in arranging and composing music.
You can find out more about me and the reason for this website at my About Me page.
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