Christmas Duets for Mandolin & Guitar arr. Allan Alexander

There are so many wonderful Christmas Carols for musicians to play. The problem for the instrumentalist lies with the fact that often the lyrics are a large part of the music. The melody is often lovely but fairly short and leaves us with having to either play a short piece or repeat the melody so often we are left with playing a short melody over and over. I thought about this and the solution for me is to write introductions and variations to the pieces. A singer wouldn’t sing the same lyrics every verse. That wouldn’t make sense. It does make sense to extend a piece with variations, keeping the feel of the piece but making it more interesting for both the players and the listener. Almost every piece in this collection has been expanded and I hope they will provide you with a great deal of pleasure. I think you will find these pieces to be playable and addictive.

Another problem is that often one musician has all the interesting parts. In these editions, both musicians will have fun as there is a great distribution of music for both players. The result is that both musicians have lovely music to play, and your listeners will love the results. Open a set with “I saw three ships” and you will get the attention of your audience.