“Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” for Low G Ukulele – FREE TAB

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The history of “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” is a bit convoluted. I’ve had to rewrite this short post several times as I’ve tried to get the details straight. There are so many twists and turns to this that I think it makes more sense to write it as a bulleted list:

• Johann Schop composed a melody in 1642 that was combined with a poem by Protestant pastor Marin Janus to create the hymn “Jesu, meiner Seelen Wonne” (“Jesus, Joy of My Soul”).
• Johann Sebastian Bach used this hymn twice in his cantata, Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben (Heart and Mouth and Deed and Life) after hearing it in a different cantata in Weimar in 1716.
• Two centuries later, in 1926, Myra Hess arranged the chorale movement of Bach’s cantata (the part based on the hymn) for solo piano, and then again a few years later for piano duet.
• Hess named her arrangements “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring,” pulling the phrase from a set of English lyrics for the chorale by Robert Bridges.
• Robert Bridges, British poet laureate, seemingly wrote the lyrics from scratch rather than translating from the original German. It’s unknown if Hess knew this or if she thought she was naming her arrangement using words from the original work.

Got all that? Bach included a hymn he had heard elsewhere in his own composition. That hymn was (very much) later transcribed for solo piano and named after lyrics written by a poet who everyone probably thought was translating the original German.

The next time you hear “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” at a wedding, remember that it’s the result of a weird, 300-year-old game of telephone.

“Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” Playing Tips

If “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” was a traditional Irish folk song, we’d call it a slip jig because of the 9/8 time signature. 9/8 is simpler than it sounds. It’s really just 3/4 time but with a triplet for each beat. So instead of counting to 9 for each measure, you can count it in your head as:

ONE-two-three TWO-two-three THREE-two-three

Like a jig, the emphasis is almost always going to be on the downbeats of a measure, regardless of whether or not the notes in between are all present.

The first eight measures of my arrangement are a never-ending string of eighth notes. Go slow until you get the hang of it, and then let it fly. It sounds really nice once you can get it up to a good tempo.

Don’t let the rest at the beginning of the first measure trip you up. It’s easy to ignore it and wind up putting the emphasis on the wrong notes throughout the rest of the piece. To get the timing of skipping that initial note in your head, you can play an open E string in its place (the same thing you do in measure 5) at first.

Counting the Chords

When the chords hit in measure 9, you can keep counting the triplet rhythm. The dotted half notes cover the first two triplets (ONE-two-three TWO-two-three) with the quarter note getting the last triplet.

Transitioning back and forth between chords and the eighth-note runs in these later sections can be tough. I’d definitely recommend a metronome when practicing this. Most metronome apps have a 9/8 setting to help you feel the correct places for emphasis.

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“Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” Low G Sheet Music Download