Three Blind Mice

About this arrangement

The whole round, not just the first line, in 6/8. The opening is three long notes falling E D C, each a dotted crotchet, then a rest; “See how they run” climbs to G. From bar 9 the words come thick and fast: “all ran af-ter the” is five quavers, and the tune sits at the top of the hand on C B A B, with the little finger reaching up to the C above. Bar 12 has the quickest notes of the piece, two semiquavers on “Did ev-”. The left hand plays a bass note and a chord on each big beat, mostly C with G7 under the Ds and Fs.

Practice tip: Learn bars 1 to 8 first, they are only five notes. For the fast middle, say the words slowly and play one note per syllable before you speed up. Once it is steady, a second player can start four bars later and it fits.

The words

Three blind mice, three blind mice, see how they run, see how they run! They all ran after the farmer's wife, she cut off their tails with a carving knife. Did ever you see such a sight in your life as three blind mice?

A short history

Three Blind Mice is one of the oldest English rounds in print. It appeared in 1609 in Deuteromelia, a collection edited by the composer Thomas Ravenscroft, with words about a miller and his merry old wife rather than a farmer’s wife; Ravenscroft may have written the music himself. The Roud Folk Song Index lists it as number 3753.

The words everyone knows now, with the carving knife, date from the 19th century and were fixed in print by James William Elliott’s National Nursery Rhymes and Nursery Songs of 1870 and the school songbooks that followed, including The Everyday Song Book of 1927 used for this arrangement.

A round is a tune that harmonises with itself: a second singer starts from the beginning when the first reaches “See how they run”, a third when the first reaches “They all ran af-ter”, and the lines fit together. That is why the melody is built almost entirely over one chord.

Quick facts

Tune

Traditional (English round, printed 1609)

Key

C major

Time signature

6/8

Length

16 bars

Tempo

Steadily, dotted crotchet = 60

Difficulty

Level 4: Up to the C above (piece 139 of 201)

Type

Round

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