21 Trumpet Christmas Duets

Description

Trumpet Christmas Duets

by Eddie Lewis

Christmas carols in this trumpet duet book include:

• Angels We Have Heard on High
• Away in a Manger
• Deck the Halls
• The First Noel
• God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
• Good King Wenceslas
• Hark the Herald Angels Sing
• The Holly and the Ivy
• In the Bleak Midwinter
• It Came Upon a Midnight Clear
• Joy to the World
• Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence
• O Come, All Ye Faithful
• O Come, O Come, Emmanuel
• O Holy Night!
• O Little Town of Bethlehem
• Quempas Carol
• Silent Night
• Still, Still, Still
• We Three Kings of Orient Are
• What Child Is This

(The list above has clickable links to pages where you can purchase the duets individually.)

Same Format as the Trumpet Hymn Duets

Technically speaking, this Trumpet Christmas Duets book is a sequel to the very popular Trumpet Hymn Duets book. That’s why we invested effort into making the cover look like it’s part of a series. When I tell people about these duets, I often use the following quote:

“These Trumpet Christmas Duets honor the harmonies and moods of the original Christmas carols.”

The reason this is significant is because of how creative my other compositions and arrangements tend to be. In the case of both the Trumpet Hymn Duets and this Trumpet Christmas Duets books, the first thing I do when I work on a new hymn or Christmas carol is to do a harmonic analysis of the original music from the hymnal. After I do this analysis, I stick to those harmonies throughout the arrangement. The only time I break from those harmonies is during the modulations or the introductions.

One Exception: I did make an exception for Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence. This is a more modern treatment, and I wasn’t originally going to include it in the Trumpet Christmas Duets book. After it was done, I felt like it was close enough to the original mood to make this one exception.

Skill Level

The skill level of the duets in Trumpet Christmas Duets is progressive, beginning in the intermediate range and advancing more towards advanced skill levels at the end of the book.

Range is mostly limited for two reasons.

1. We received a lot of requests for these duets to be in the staff. We publish a lot of materials for trumpet players of all skill levels and don’t mind honoring such requests when they are presented respectfully.
2. I also know that these duets will be used on trumpet duet gigs. I’ve used these duets twice (as of this writing) and it really helps the endurance to keep the majority of the music inside the staff.

The skill level towards the end of the book is only moderately more advanced. Those duets have more sixteenth-notes and occasional chromaticism.

The duets in this book are playable by most good high school students and sight readable by most good college level players.

Play-Along Album

Just as with the Trumpet Hymn Duets, we are publishing an album of play-along recordings for this book. That album is available here at Tiger Music. It will also be available for download at iTunes and available for streaming at most places where music is streamed.

The naming on the play-along files is set where the name of the part in the title of the file is the instrument in the recording. If it says Away in a Manger (Trumpet 1), then you play the second trumpet part. If the name says Away in a Manger (Trumpet 2), then you play the first trumpet part.

Tempo de Learno Recordings

We are considering selling slower versions of the play-alongs separately for trumpet players who would like practice versions wit work with. If this is something that interests you, then please let us know.

Video Ad

Here is a video of me talking about the trumpet duets in the Trumpet Christmas Duets book: