70 Simple Songs for the 8-Note Tongue Drum. Without Musical Notes

We call this series “I don’t read music” since we are targeting beginners of all ages: children, teens, parents, grandparents.

Folk music traditionally is not learned from sheet music or notes. Instead, it is learned by repetition and from being passed from generation to generation. We believe in this method of teaching, which is easier and more enjoyable.

All 70 songs in this book have been written without using the classic music score system
because it is for the absolute beginners who can not read sheet music. This book is aimed at those who want to add popular melodies to their experimentation.

We use circles with numbers because most modern tongue drums have numbers engraved or painted on their keys. We do not show the note duration. You can experiment with a duration on your own.
We recommend finding each of these songs on YouTube and listening to the rhythm before beginning to play.
Our sheet music is only a guide. The most important thing is to listen and repeat the recordings.

All songs from this book are possible to play in one octave.
These songs are suitable for a diatonic 8-note tongue drum, which should have numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 1 of the next octave.
Please note: if you have a model of the tongue drum with 5 tongues, or if some keys from the octave are missing, you will not be able to play all of the songs in this book.

The songbook includes very simple, popular children’s and folk songs, but even well-known children’s songs played on the tong drum will create an unusual magical sound.

Table of contents

PART 1
A Hunting We Will Go
Acka Backa
Bell Horses
Bobby Shafto
Doggie Doggie
Frog in the Meadow
Hot Cross Buns
London Bridge
Long-legged Sailor
Mary Had a Little Lamb
Miss Mary Mack
Ninety-Nine Bottles
Old Bald Eagle
One, Two, Three, Four
Rain, Rain, Go Away
Ring Around the Rosie
Rub-a-Dub-Dub
See-Saw Margery Daw
Ten in the Bed
The Wheels on the Bus

PART 2
Alphabet Song
A Sailor Went to Sea
Are You Sleeping
Baa Baa Black Sheep
Baby Bumble Bee
Cobbler, Mend My Shoe
Cotton Eyed Joe
Ding Dong DiggiDiggiDong
Do You Know the Muffin Man?
Doctor Foster
Five Little Ducks
Five Little Monkeys
Happy Birthday
Humpty Dumpty
I Like to Eat Apples and Bananas
I Love Little Kitty
It’s Raining
Jack and Jill
Jingle Bells
La Cucaracha
Lavender’s Blue
Little Jack Horner
Michael, Row the Boat Ashore
My Hat
Oh We Can Play on the Big Bass Drum
Old Blue
Old McDonald
Old Mother Hubbard
Row Row Your Boat
The Backer
The Beep and the Pup
The Mulberry Bush
This Old Man
Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star
We Wish You a Merry Christmas

PART 3
Bim Bum Biddy
Brahms Lullaby
Chumbara
Cock-a-Doodle Doo
Fiddle-De-Dee
Itsy Bitsy Spider
Jolly Old Saint Nicholas
Kookaburra
Li’l Liza Jane
Ode to Joy
Oh Susannah
Peace Like a River
The Big Sheep
Tinga Layo
To Market, to Market