Ho Ho Père Noël
Price range: $7.50 through $22.00
These singers are checking Santa’s progress as he makes his Christmas Eve deliveries. Is he traveling right and left or high and low as he flies around the world? Is he going fast or slow as he flies in his sleigh?
Ho Ho Père Noël is a simple song ideal for early French Immersion or young Francophone singers. The lyrics are drawn from early French vocabulary such as à droit, à gauche, en haut, en bas, vite, lent, etc. The repetitious patterns make the words easy to remember and to sing. Repeated verses create length to the song without adding a heavy lyric load. Adding actions helps reinforce the lyrics. The simple melody is also accessible for children who have only been singing together with others for a short time.
Add simple actions for an effective visual presentation of this song for elementary school concerts or vocal studio recitals with a Christmas flavour.
Listen to melody + piano accompaniment:
Download Includes:
- Vocal score
- Lead sheet
- Director/piano score
- Lyrics
- Accompaniment – with melody guide
- Accompaniment – piano
- Teaching Tips
Share this page using these social links!
Ho Ho Père Noël
Follow along with the lyrics as you listen to the accompaniment with melody guide for Ho Ho Père Noël.
piano accompaniment + melody guide (sample)
Add Actions
Many of the lyrics in this song refer to directions (up, down, left right. fast, slow, etc.).
Add actions that correspond with the words to create visual interest and to assist the students with remembering what to sing.
Include scarves in the performance for a colourful addition to highlight the actions.
Ask classroom teachers to review and reinforce the lyrics and the actions with the students. Even if they are not singing the song, daily review helps young students to learn the lyrics. This is particularly helpful if French is not their first language.
Expressive Singing
It is never too soon to start talking about expressive singing with young singers.
Use clear diction, facial expression, dynamics, and simple actions to bring the story to life.
Talk with students about what they think should be added to the performance. This allows young singers to take ownership of their performance and to make thoughtful decisions through guided discussion about the options they might consider.
Encourage students to think about the overall effect and audience appeal when they are making their choices.
Keep in mind that too much and too little can both detract from a musical performance!
Ho Ho Père Noël
I needed a song for my “Littles” to sing in the school Christmas concert. It is amazing how many of my songs came into being from the sheer necessity of finding concert material. To complicate my repertoire decision, the group was a Grade P/1 French immersion class. As always, for the youngest students, the words needed to be repetitious and easy to remember. In addition, because the young students had been in the immersion program for only a few months, their vocabulary was limited. This made choosing the right song even more challenging.
The simple song I ended up writing for my students was “Ho ho, Père Noël”. We repeated the lyric “Ho Ho Père Noël” at the beginning of each phrase followed by asking Santa, where will you go? (où vas-tu Papa Noël?). Then I added a few directional words I knew the students were learning such as up and down (en haut, en bas) and then, of course, we needed to have Santa fly around the world (vole autour du monde). We repeated the entire song twice to give it some length without adding lyric “overload” and actions were added to help the students remember the words. To create visual interest, each student had a scarf to hold and move around as they did the actions, adding pizzazz to our simple song. The students did a fine job with the lyrics and they looked great! My young students were proud of their successful contribution to the concert, and of course they were a hit with the audience. And the song has been in concert rotation (in French and in English) multiple times since its debut.
When you have enjoyed singing this song with your students - please drop by again and leave a Review on this page. Thanks so much - we really appreciate it!
Send us your video of Ho Ho Père Noël and perhaps we can post it here.
| License | Single User License, Classroom / Studio License, Treble Choir License |
|---|---|
| Context | Action / Movement Songs, Action Songs, Choir – Elementary, Choir Repertoire, Classroom Songs, Movement Songs, Small Group Class, Vocal Solo, Choir – Unison, French |
| Topic | |
| Level | |
| Voicing | |
| Vocal Range | D4 – C5 |
| Duration | |
| Composer | Donna Rhodenizer |
| Music | Donna Rhodenizer |
Reviews
There are no reviews yet.