Green notes: right hand, blue notes: left hand. Preview played right in your browser with the app's real piano (lightweight version). Inside Pianovera: full multi-layer sound, fingering display and Wait mode.
In his Album for the Young, Tchaikovsky takes children traveling: a Neapolitan song, a German one, a Russian one... and this "old French song" in G minor, so well felt that he reused it in his opera The Maid of Orleans. A simple melody, a 188-note MIDI, that sounds like a very old memory.
It's one of the most beautiful slow pieces you can hand a beginner: a melody to sing, a left hand in discreet counterpoint, and a phrasing lesson in every line. No technical traps, but one demand: it has to sing, or nothing is left.
The Old French Song: the first notes
Right hand, in letter names (C4 = middle C): D4 G4 A4 A#4 C5 D5 D5 C5 D5 D#5 C5 D5 D5 C5 D5 D#5 C5 D5 D#5 D5 C5 A#4 A4 G4… The rest scrolls in the preview above, with the fingering, and the sheet music PDF has the whole piece.
Play the Old French Song on the virtual piano
Here are the virtual piano notes for the Old French Song, in computer keyboard letters: the first 8 bars of the melody. One key per note, read left to right; dark keys are the sharps, and a thin line marks each bar.
Letters for a QWERTY keyboardYour keyboard: 26 notes
WTY7IOOIO0IOO
IO0IO0OI7YTTW
▶ Play on the virtual pianoThe piano opens with this piece loaded: the key to play lights up and waits for you.
What you'll be working on
A legato melody singing from end to end
The left hand as counterpoint, melodic in its own right
The twin phrases: same start, different endings
Restraint: melancholy, never tearful
Playing the Old French Song on piano with Pianovera
Show both hand colors in Pianovera and notice how the left answers the right: it's a duet, not melody-plus-chords. Wait mode lets you place each answer at your own pace.
Open Old French Song in Pianovera: the notes fall toward an 88-key virtual piano keyboard, each hand gets its color, and Wait mode is there if you're starting out. On a PC, it's falling notes piano software for Windows, with video export up to 4K.
Free, with no time limit and no ads: 30 pieces (10 in full, 20 in a simplified version), the first 10 lessons and 10 minutes of 3D hands (then 15 seconds per piece). Premium opens all 651 pieces.
The work itself is in the public domain, and this MIDI engraving was placed in the public domain by its typesetter on the Mutopia Project. Use it freely, videos included.
About this piece
Is the Old French Song hard to play on piano?
We rate it beginner: 188 notes over 0:55, spanning G2 to F5. The first thing to work on: a legato melody singing from end to end.
Where can I get the sheet music for the Old French Song?
Right on this page: the "View the sheet music" button opens the PDF (160 KB), engraved by the Mutopia Project from the same source as the MIDI file, Public domain license. View it, print it, keep it.
Is the Old French Song MIDI file really free?
Yes. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky died more than 70 years ago, so the work (1878) is public domain. This MIDI engraving is public domain too: download it and use it freely, videos included.
