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Piano sheet music for kids · Classical · Level 4: Up to the C above
Brahms’ Lullaby (Wiegenlied)
Free beginner piano sheet music: C major, 3/4, 16 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
Brahms wrote this cradle song in 1868 and it has been sung to babies ever since. It is in 3/4, like Happy Birthday, and starts with two quaver pickups (E E) before the first bar line. Brahms’ key is E flat; here it is C major, so the right hand sits in C position and reaches up to the C above middle C in bars 3, 8, 9 and 13, the top of the tune, and there are rests to count through in bars 2, 6 and 8. The left hand plays a waltz bass, a bass note then two chords, on C, G7 and F; Brahms’ own left hand rocks in syncopation, which is for later. It is given here as an instrumental piece, without words.
Practice tip: Learn the left-hand waltz bass alone until it rocks by itself. Then sing the tune over it; the two quick quavers at the end of a bar always lead into the next one, so keep them light.
A short history
Johannes Brahms wrote the Wiegenlied (“Cradle Song”), Op. 49 No. 4, in 1868 for Bertha Faber of Vienna, on the birth of her second son. Years earlier, as Bertha Porubszky, she had sung in the women’s choir Brahms ran in Hamburg, and she used to sing him a Viennese love song; Brahms worked that tune into the piano part, and told the Fabers that while Bertha sang the baby to sleep, a love song would be sung to her.
The first verse, “Guten Abend, gut’ Nacht”, is an old German folk rhyme from the collection Des Knaben Wunderhorn; the second verse was added by Georg Scherer in 1849. The song was first sung in public in Vienna in December 1869 by Luise Dustmann, with Clara Schumann at the piano.
It became one of the best-known melodies in the world: music boxes, cot mobiles and films have carried it to children who have never heard the name Brahms.
Quick facts
- Tune
- Johannes Brahms, 1868
- Key
- C major
- Time signature
- 3/4
- Length
- 16 bars and a pickup
- Tempo
- Gently rocking, crotchet = 100
- Difficulty
- Level 4: Up to the C above (piece 113 of 201)
- Type
- Classical
- 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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