TonalicsJOURNALOpen Tuner
‹ Steel Drum songs
SongsDeck the Halls
Play a different song (36)
Play along
  1. 5
  2. 4
  3. 3
  4. 2
  5. 1
  6. 2
  7. 3
  8. 1
  9. 2
  10. 3
  11. 4
  12. 2
  13. 3
  14. 2
  15. 1
  16. 7,
  17. 1
  18. 5
  19. 4
  20. 3
  21. 2
  22. 1
  23. 2
  24. 3
  25. 1
  26. 2
  27. 3
  28. 4
  29. 2
  30. 3
  31. 2
  32. 1
  33. 7,
  34. 1
  35. 2
  36. 3
  37. 4
  38. 2
  39. 3
  40. 4
  41. 5
  42. 2
  43. 3
  44. 4
  45. 5
  46. 6
  47. 7
  48. 1'
  49. 7
  50. 6
  51. 5
  52. 5
  53. 4
  54. 3
  55. 2
  56. 1
  57. 2
  58. 3
  59. 1
  60. 6
  61. 6
  62. 6
  63. 6
  64. 5
  65. 4
  66. 3
  67. 2
  68. 1

Welsh traditional air “Nos Galan”, in print by the 1790s. Public domain.

29 notes · C4–E6 · 29 notes in three rings · The lead pan of a steel band, in the fourths-and-fifths layout almost every tenor is built in today.

Tap a note, or drag across them to roll from note to note. On a keyboard the letters on the notes are the ones to press — they climb the pan a semitone at a time from the low C.

Steel DrumFree · printable · plays in your browser

Deck the Halls — Steel Drum Letter Notes

Deck the Halls, written out for the steel drum as letter notes, phrase by phrase, an octave lower. Press Play to hear it, Practice to learn it one note at a time — the steel drum waits for you — or Play along to keep time with it.

  • Notes68, 9 pitches
  • RangeE4–F5
  • Key hereF major
  • Tempo132 bpm · about 29 s
  • LevelIntermediate

Can a steel drum play Deck the Halls?

↕ Plays, moved Not where the library writes it, but it fits an octave lower: F major, E4 to F5. That is the version loaded above and printed below. The check is made note by note against what the instrument can actually sound.

Deck the Halls: steel drum letter notes

The large line is the note stamped on the pan; the small line under it is its number in the scale. A dash holds the note another beat, an underline is half a beat, and a dot beside a note makes it half as long again. Each line is one phrase.

▶ Play it above

Deck the Halls — steel drum letter notes · tonalics.com

The 9 notes it uses

Lowest to highest, with how many times each is played. Learn these 9 and you can play the whole tune.

  • E7×2
  • F1×11
  • G2×16
  • A3×14
  • B♭4×9
  • C5×7
  • D6×6
  • E7×2
  • F1×1

What to expect on a steel drum

  • It runs from E4 to F5, an octave and a semitone, using 9 different notes. That leaves 4 semitones unused below and 11 above.
  • 87% of its moves are a step or a repeated note. The widest is a major sixth, F4 to D5, at note 60.
  • Its notes sit in 2 of the pan’s three rings, so the stick moves in and out as well as around.

About the tune

The tune is the Welsh winter air “Nos Galan” — New Year’s Eve — a dance melody that was sung with improvised verses and a harp answering each line. It was in print by the 1790s, and the English Christmas words were added in 1862.

Welsh traditional air “Nos Galan”, in print by the 1790s. Public domain. The notes follow Paul Hardy’s Xmas Tunebook, 2019 (2024), cross-checked against 2 other transcriptions. More about Deck the Halls →

Deck the Halls on other instruments

The same melody, in each instrument’s own notation. It is not offered for the guzheng or handpan, which do not have the notes.

More songs for the steel drum

All 36 steel drum songs · Christmas songs for steel drum · The online steel drum on its own

Playing it on a real steel drum?

If it sounds wrong, check the instrument before the notes. The handpan tuner listens through your microphone and names what each note is actually sounding.

🎙 Open the Handpan Tuner