Free Handbell Music – ‘Twas in the Moon of Wintertime

Here’s a little holiday gift for anyone who would like to play our eight-bell arrangement of “‘Twas in the Moon of Wintertime”. We’ve updated the “standard version” for 2015, and this week you can download the score completely free of charge!

Here’s a video of us rehearsing the new version of the piece:

If you’ve played our 8-bell arrangement of this piece before, you’ll notice that most of the changes have been made to the first half of the piece. If you can already play the previous version, you should have no trouble adding the extra notes in the updated version. It won’t feel like having to learn a whole new piece. Best of all, those newly-added notes will cost you nothing!

And if you’ve never played our 8-bell music before – here’s an opportunity to try it without having to pay any money. What could be better? Okay, don’t answer that. There probably are better things. But hey… free music is free music, and we hope you’ll enjoy playing this piece.

To get the music, just go to the “Twas in the Moon of Wintertime” page on our music site. There’s no requirement to “like” our Facebook page. We don’t ask you to buy anything, subscribe to anything or jump through any kind of hoops. Just select the standard version, enter your name and email address, and click on the download button. You’ll receive an emailed link to download your music in the usual way.

Happy ringing!

In the Moon of Wintertime handbells
Christmas handbells

New 8-Bell Music for Christmas 2015!

In the handbell world, our thoughts turn to Christmas and holiday music before most people have even started thinking about the end of the summer. The dilemma is whether to risk being annoying by talking about Christmas when there are still several months to go, or whether to go full-tilt into the festive season, release new Christmas music, and give all the handbell musicians out there plenty of time to practise it before the season arrives. The end of September is approaching. It feels like the right time to introduce our new 8-bell muisc for Christmas 2015.

The following pieces are all available for purchase and download from our music site – and if you click on each individual title, you’ll be taken to the page with more information about each piece, the bells required, and how to make your purchase. Each piece can be played by two, three, four or more people – and we hope you’ll enjoy them!

Angels We Have Heard on High

The First Nowell

Good King Wenceslas

It Came Upon the Midnight Clear

O Come, All Ye Faithful

O Holy Night

Once in Royal David’s City

While Shepherds Watched their Flocks

We hope you’ll enjoy playing some of our new 8-bell music for the holiday season. If you haven’t already done so, don’t forget to check out our new Christmas music for twelve bells too!

New 8-bell music for Christmas
The most wonderful time of the year!

New Music for Handbells – I Sing the Mighty Power of God

I Sing the Mighty Power of God will probably be our last 8-bell hymn arrangement of 2015. We need to turn our thoughts to Christmas and holiday music! This hymn tune is ELLACOMBE; the name of a village in England. This tune is also used as the setting for the Palm Sunday hymn Hosanna, Loud Hosanna.

This piece was a lot of fun to learn, particularly in those moments when the repeated notes failed us, and we felt as though we were playing something more akin to “Waltzing Matilda” than the tune we were aiming for. Try it for yourself, and see if you notice the same thing!

More information about the sheet music for this piece

If you’d like to play I Sing the Mighty Power of God, the music is available for purchase and download from Choraegus.

When you buy music from Choraegus, it will come to you as a digital download – a PDF file. You’ll be responsible for printing your own music, and you won’t receive anything in the mail. Your purchase of this 8-bell hymn arrangement allows you to print up to 4 copies for your handbell group. Please see our licensing agreement for full details.

If this is your first time buying music from Choraegus, you might find our step-by-step guide useful. We designed this to take you through the purchase process and make it stress-free!

Any questions?

If you have any questions about buying or playing our music, please check our Frequently-Asked Questions, in case the answer is there! If you don’t find the information you’re looking for, please contact us and we’ll be happy to help.

New 12-Bell Music for Christmas 2015!

We’re excited about our new 12-bell music for Christmas 2015! These recordings once again feature Larry’s son J.C., who plays the four bells we can’t manage to play between us.

We didn’t have very much time with J.C on his recent visit. The videos were all made on our first or second read-through of each piece. As a result, there may be be wrong notes or rhythms that are not entirely accurate. We apologise in advance for all those things, but we hope these slightly dubious recordings will provide enough of an idea of how the pieces could sound, given the opportunity for a bit more rehearsal. We hope to have another opportunity to play these arrangements before too long. Please contact us if you have any questions about any of this music, and we’ll be happy to help.

Angels We Have Heard on High

Bring a Torch, Jeanette, Isabella

Ding Dong, Merrily on High

It Came Upon the Midnight Clear

We Three Kings

All these pieces are available for purchase and download from Choraegus. Purchase comes with permission to perform these pieces as part of a concert or worship service. We hope you enjoy playing this new 12-bell music!

new 12-bell music for Christmas
Christmas handbells!

New Handbell Music – our Third “Surprisingly Easy” 8-Bell Hymn Collection

Following on from our first Surprisingly Easy™ 8-Bell Hymn Collection and our second Surprisingly Easy™ 8-Bell Hymn Collection, here is the third Surprisingly Easy collection!

Once again, it’s all the music, but without the twiddly bits. If you’re looking for some new handbell pieces to enhance your worship service, but you don’t want them to take too long to learn, this collection could be the answer. If you’re part of a duet, trio or quartet, or your handbell choir is enthusiastic but small in number, these hymns could be what you’re looking for!

What’s included in the third collection?

The hymns included in this third collection are:

  • Praise to the Lord, the Almighty
  • Sing Praise to God Who Reigns Above
  • All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name (Coronation)
  • At the Cross
  • Great is Thy Faithfulness
  • Jesus Shall Reign
  • He Keeps Me Singing

How to get the sheet music

If you’d like to purchase and download this hymn collection for your group to play, it’s available from Choraegus. Each of these hymns is also available separately.

When you buy Choraegus handbell music, you’ll receive a link to a digital download (PDF) file. You’ll be responsible for printing your own music, so you won’t receive anything in the mail. Your purchase of the Third Surprisingly Easy Hymn Collection entitles you to print up to 4 copies for your handbell group.

Any questions?

If you have any questions about buying or playing our handbell music, you might like to look at some Frequently-Asked Questions. If you don’t find the answers you’re looking for, please contact us and we’ll be happy to help.

Third Surprisingly Easy Hymn Collection - 8-bell music

New Music for Handbells – Wrong Foot Forward

Wrong Foot Forward is our latest handbell arrangement for 8 bells. If you’re looking for a fun challenge in 7/8, this could be the piece for you!

More information about the music

Wrong Foot Forward was written by Sarah Allen and Brian Finnegan of the Anglo-Irish band Flook. We arranged it with their kind permission. It’s a slip jig with a difference, and we’ve enjoyed learning it!

If you’d like to play this arrangement, the sheet music is available for purchase and download from Choraegus. We also have lots of other Irish jigs, hornpipes and traditional tunes. If you’re looking for music to dance to, you might find it on Choraegus!

Please note that Choraegus handbell music comes to you as a PDF file. This means you’ll be responsible for printing your own music, and you won’t receive anything in the mail. If you haven’t bought music from us before, we recommend our step-by-step guide! We designed this in an attempt to make the purchase process straightforward and stress-free.

Any questions?

We’re always happy to answer any questions about buying or playing our music. We put together a list of Frequently-Asked Questions, so you might like to look there first. If you don’t find the answer you need, please let us know!

Wrong Foot Forward - handbells

New Music for Handbells – Come Christians, Join to Sing

While we were in Soledad for our #Pinnacles15 adventure, we played through some of our brand new, unpublished pieces. Come Christians, Join to Sing is one of these new pieces.

We didn’t want to annoy other hotel guests by playing handbells in our room. So we decided to find another practice location instead. We chose the pretty church of Our Lady of Solitude in Soledad. We played outside the church, as the sun went down and the light became poorer and poorer. Yes, it was pretty, and fairly quiet. No, it was not easy to see our music!

Here’s Come, Christians, which actually isn’t completely new to us. We’ve played it a couple of times recently in church services. For some unknown reason, we completely forgot to record or publish it until now. It’s a fun and lively arrangement of the Spanish hymn tune Madrid.

Would you like to play this arrangement?

If you’d like to play Come Christians, Join to Sing, the music is available for purchase and download from Choraegus.

If you haven’t bought music from Choraegus before, we recommend reading our step-by-step guide. Your purchase (pay once) entitles you to print up to 4 copies for your group. Please read our licensing agreement for full details.

Any questions?

If you have any questions, please get in touch, and we’ll be happy to help!

More Music for Twelve Bells!

We’ve had lots of fun with our eight-bell music. Sometimes it’s also fun to branch out and expand a little. Here’s some new music for twelve bells!

Of course, we can only play four bells each at one time. It’s a problem when we suddenly have 12-bell music, and don’t have a hope of playing it on our own! That’s when we turn to J.C for help. J.C. doesn’t do this stuff on a regular basis, but he has plenty of musical talent, and very little fear of scary handbell music situations. After all, he used to play in Low Ding Zone!

On this occasion we didn’t have a lot of time to spend together. We decided to read through the music, and record as many pieces as we could in as short a time as possible.

Here are the resulting videos from our recent sight-reading sessions. They’re all from either the first or second attempt at playing them. For that reason, the following demonstrations are far from polished. However, they should give you an idea of how the new pieces could sound with a bit more rehearsal!

Although we’re playing these pieces as a four-in-hand trio, they could also be played with up to 6 people, with just 2 bells each. Click on the titles if you’d like to find out more about each piece.

Farandole

Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee

Morning Has Broken

My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean

(with apologies to the rather surprised-looking lady who appears in the background at around 1:20!)

O Worship the King

Shenandoah

There is a Fountain

Any questions?

If you have any questions about buying or playing Choraegus handbell music, please contact us, and we’ll be happy to help!

Music for twelve bells - Choraegus
Choraegus – Bringing Music to the People

Handbell Duets at the Chapel of the Chimes, Hayward

What do you do when it’s the Fourth of July, and you’ve finished eating party food and having fun with family and friends? The answer is… play handbell duets, of course!

handbell duets at the Chapel of the Chimes

An impromptu handbell duet performance

We were in Hayward, California for a family gathering, and we decided we needed to burn off some of the calories we’d consumed at lunch time. We were driving in the direction of home, and noticed the Chapel of the Chimes. Suddenly looked like a great location for a Concert With No Audience! 

The Chapel of the Chimes is a 61-acre cemetery, crematorium and funeral home complex. It didn’t appear that we’d be disturbing anyone with our music, so we set up our table and bells. We played duets for around forty minutes! It was a great opportunity to play through some of the music for our visit to Los Altos Lutheran Church the following day. We also brought out some of the older pieces we hadn’t played for a very long time!

We had the usual interesting challenges that go with outdoor performances – a strong breeze, traffic noise, and even some festive firecrackers! The location and the sunshine also made it a very stripy-looking performance, as you can see from the video!

The following pieces are on the video:

  • America, the Beautiful
  • Come, Christians, Join to Sing
  • Drink to Me Only
  • Beautiful Dreamer
  • A Mighty Fortress
  • Moreton Bay
  • Great is Thy Faithfulness
  • Danny Boy
  • Botany Bay
  • Earth and All Stars
  • I Need Thee Every Hour
  • The King of Love My Shepherd Is
  • Allegro

We hope you enjoyed our handbell duets at the Chapel of the Chimes. All the pieces we played are available (or coming soon!) from Choraegus. If you’d like to book us for a performance with an audience, please let us know!

New Music for Handbells – our Second “Surprisingly Easy” Hymn Collection

Following on from our first Surprisingly Easy™ Eight-Bell Hymn Collection – here is a new collection! Once again, it’s all the music, but without the twiddly bits.

If you’re looking for some new handbell pieces to enhance your worship service, but you don’t want them to take too long to learn, this collection could be the answer. If you’re part of a duet, trio or quartet, or your handbell choir is enthusiastic but small in number, these hymns could be what you’re looking for!

The hymns included in this second collection are:

  • All Creatures of Our God and King
  • Just As I Am
  • All the Way My Savior Leads Me
  • It is Well with My Soul
  • Amazing Grace
  • Jesus Walked this Lonesome Valley
  • Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken
  • Praise Him! Praise Him!

Would you like to play these arrangements?

If you’d like to purchase and download this hymn collection for your group to play, it’s available from Choraegus. Each of the hymns is also available separately.  

Please note that Choraegus handbell music is designed to be downloaded as PDF files. You’ll be responsible for printing your own music, and you won’t receive anything by mail. Please read our licensing agreement for full details. If you’re new to buying music from Choraegus, we also recommend our step-by-step guide. We designed this to make the purchase process stress-free for you!

Any questions?

If you have any questions about buying or playing our music, you might like to check our Frequently-Asked Questions. If you don’t find the information you need, please contact us and we’ll be happy to help!

Hymn Collection - 2nd surprisingly easy handbell music
Choraegus – Bringing Music to the People