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SongsGood King Wenceslas
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The spring carol “Tempus adest floridum”, from Piae Cantiones, 1582. 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

Good King Wenceslas — Steel Drum Letter Notes

Good King Wenceslas, written out for the steel drum as letter notes, phrase by phrase. 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.

  • Notes53, 8 pitches
  • RangeC5–C6
  • Key hereF major
  • Tempo120 bpm · about 34 s
  • LevelEasy

Can a steel drum play Good King Wenceslas?

✓ Plays as written Every note of it is on the steel drum, in F major from C5 to C6. The check is made note by note against what the instrument can actually sound.

Good King Wenceslas: 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

Good King Wenceslas — steel drum letter notes · tonalics.com

The 8 notes it uses

Lowest to highest, with how many times each is played. Learn these 8 and you can play the whole tune.

  • C5×7
  • D6×7
  • E7×4
  • F1×21
  • G2×6
  • A3×3
  • B♭4×3
  • C5×2

What to expect on a steel drum

  • It runs from C5 to C6, an octave, using 8 different notes. That leaves 12 semitones unused below and 4 above.
  • 85% of its moves are a step or a repeated note. The widest is a fifth, F5 to C6, at note 27.
  • 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 a 13th-century spring carol, “Tempus adest floridum”, printed in the Finnish songbook Piae Cantiones in 1582. In 1853 the English hymn writer John Mason Neale wrote new words for it about the Bohemian duke Wenceslas, and a song about flowers became a song about snow.

The spring carol “Tempus adest floridum”, from Piae Cantiones, 1582. Public domain. The notes follow Douglas D. Anderson, The Hymns and Carols of Christmas (sequence released to the public domain), cross-checked against 2 other transcriptions. More about Good King Wenceslas →

Good King Wenceslas on other instruments

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