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Piano sheet music for kids · Nursery rhyme · Level 3: Notes below middle C
Bobby Shafto
Free beginner piano sheet music: C major, 2/4, 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
A bright 2/4 song, two beats to a bar, written almost entirely in quavers, so the right hand is busy from the first note: “Bob-by Shaf-to’s” is four quick notes, C, C, C, F. Bars 1 and 5 sit in C position with a stretch to F; bars 3 and 4 (“Silver buckles at his knee”) drop the hand so the thumb is on the G below middle C and the fingers cover G to D. The second half, “Bobby Shafto’s bright and fair”, rocks between E and G and D and F, with B just below the thumb. The left hand plays plain crotchet chords, C and G7, two to a bar.
Practice tip: Clap the words first: every syllable is one quaver, and “sea”, “knee” and “me” each get two notes. Then play bars 3 and 4 alone, thumb on the low G, before joining them to the rest.
The words
Bobby Shafto's gone to sea Silver buckles at his knee, He'll come back and marry me, Bonny Bobby Shafto! Bobby Shafto's bright and fair, Combing down his yellow hair, He's my love for evermore, Bonny Bobby Shafto!
A short history
Bobby Shafto is a song from the north-east of England. The Opies record it as a Tyneside election song: Robert Shafto of Whitworth, County Durham, stood for Parliament in 1761 and his supporters sang of his bright yellow hair. A local story adds that Bridget Belasyse of Brancepeth Castle died of a broken heart when he married someone else, though the dates do not quite fit.
The first verse was printed in 1805, and John Bell’s Rhymes of Northern Bards (Newcastle, 1812) added more. The tune is older than the words: it is found as “Brave Willie Forster” in a Northumbrian fiddler’s manuscript of the 1690s.
The melody here is the one usually sung today, a version in 2/4 time with the second verse, “Bobby Shafto’s bright and fair, combing down his yellow hair”.
Quick facts
- Tune
- Traditional (Northumbrian, 18th century)
- Key
- C major
- Time signature
- 2/4
- Length
- 16 bars
- Tempo
- Jauntily, crotchet = 108
- Difficulty
- Level 3: Notes below middle C (piece 40 of 201)
- Type
- Nursery rhyme
- 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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