The Spanish Lady
The Spanish Lady is a fun, pretty, and fast-moving song from Ireland. And vigorous! Download the free fiddle music and easy acoustic guitar tabs for it here! Also, a piano arrangement to use with singers.
Now with an easy Middle C shared-hands melody arrangement, and a duet secondo with energetic chords to accompany it!
Please scroll down the page for the download links.
A great song for singers
This song was introduced to me by one of my students, who asked if she could sing it. Browsing through her favorite singers on YouTube, she had encountered the group Celtic Woman singing this song.
This free vocal sheet music is very pretty, bouncy, and great fun to sing with a group of other singers.
Turn Spanish Lady into a piano duet
This easy-to-understand duet secondo goes with the melody shown above:
As you can see, it is just root position chords, jumping back and forth.
Despite its simplicity, this is a very effective accompaniment to the Spanish Lady melody, and there are a few small challenges for your students with the timing!
Please scroll down the page for the download links.
A great piece for fiddle and guitar
No sooner had I begun giving this song to my vocal students, than my guitar players and fiddlers also wanted to play it, so I added guitar tabs to the sheet music.
Please scroll down the page for the download links.
Several of my vocal students have and enjoy the Celtic Woman Songbook, which has not just vocal pieces, but also instrumentals such as "The Butterfly" for violin. However, the book does not have Spanish Lady in it!
The key of G seems to be best
This song is easier both for guitar and violin players in the key of G, I think.
For fiddlers who play it in G, it is very fun and not too hard to execute double stop notes - a drone - at the bottom of page 1, where the melody goes, "First she washed them..."
Just use the open D string as harmony for the notes of the A string, until you reach the melody change again at "Whack fol the too-rah..."
(This may seem terribly obvious to all you fiddlers of many years' experience, but to me, a pianist who first held a real violin in her hands as a music major in college in String Methods I, playing the violin is still a learning adventure!)
A lead sheet all on one page
Please scroll down the page for the download links.
I like the way the Celtic Woman version starts with a soloist, then bursts into harmony, so I wrote parts for the middle and end of each verse. The bottom voices are pretty simple, so less-experienced, younger singers can pick them up quickly.
Please scroll down the page for the download links.
Don't make the accompaniment heavy
Unless you're real handy with fast-moving piano chords, I wouldn't treat the top staff of this version as a piano part -- playing those parallel sixths on the piano could really slow the piece down!
The single line of version one would be preferable, so that the piano could skip along. (Unless playing fast parallel sixths is easy for you, of course. I still think it would weigh the song down.)
The Spanish Lady has become a fast favorite among my students, and I'm betting it will be with yours, too!
The links to the easy piano melody & duet secondo:
Download the Spanish Lady melody arranged at Middle C
Download the secondo duet part accompaniment for the Middle C melody
The links to the guitar music:
Download free Celtic sheet music and easy acoustic guitar tabs in key of G
Download free guitar tabs and free fiddle music in key of A
The links to the lead sheets:
Download Spanish Lady lead sheet in the key of A
Download printable lead sheet in the key of G
The links to the vocal harmonies:
Download Celtic Woman song with vocal harmony in the key of A
Download Celtic Woman song with vocal harmony in the key of G
More Folk & Traditional Songs
Ae Fond Kiss - not strictly a folk melody, but it is old - and very lovely!
Colorado Trail - a genuine cowboy song, just one verse, surprisingly lovely
Erie Canal - a vigorous minor melody that kids like, with lots of repeating phrases
Johnny Has Gone for a Soldier - Lovely. Important for breath control and learning to mold a phrase
Loch Lomond, the most famous song of all from Scotland. Still beautiful
Muss i denn or Abschied (Wooden Heart) - from Germany by way of Elvis, an adorable folk tune!
Once I Had a Sweetheart - another sad, pretty, and image-arousing song, once sung by Joan Baez
Scarborough Fair - an old favorite from England, still lovely
Shenandoah - So pretty, and genuinely American. Long phrases, good breath control practice
Dianna:
Your website is a light in the darkness. THANK YOU for all you do in helping to spread the love of music. It matters!
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Carrie,Voice and Piano Teacher:
This site is FABULOUS.
For all the reasons you explain on the site itself--this is exactly what piano teachers need! (I still need to go look at the vocal music). Wow. THANK YOU SO MUCH!
Marianne:
You are awesome. Thank you. I'm a voice and piano teacher and to have so many pieces in one place- for many different levels- is a Godsend. Thank you for the time and effort you have put in to make this so easily available to all of us stressed music teachers!!!
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Comments
Do you have a funny story about this music, or does it remind you of something you'd like to share with other readers? Do you have a question? I'd love to hear it!
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Vocal Exercises for Teachers of Singing?
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Your music web site is very useful. For the teachers and students, very interesting to read.I am one of your web-site fans living …
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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