He Lives On High: hymn tune in Tonic Solfa
He Lives On High, the hymn tune, in Tonic Solfa (doh is Bb): the solfa line by line, staff notation and a piano to sing along with.
Download the solfa (PDF)A4, free to print and share with your choir
- Key
- Bb major
- Doh
- Bb
- Time
- 4/4
- Starts on
- s, (F)
- Range
- s, to f (F to E♭, a seventh)
- Metre
- Irregular
- Music
- Hawaiian Folk Tune
Melody from the Christian Classics Ethereal Hymnary (CCEH, public domain); tune HE LIVES ON HIGH (Hawaiian Folk Tune). Sources and licences.
The solfa
| s,d | m--rd-,t,dl, | s,---s,-m- |
| rr-dermf-,m | r-----s,d |
| m--rd-,t,dl, | s,---s,-dt, |
| l,-rdt,t,m-,r | d-----_s, |
| l,-d-f--l, | s,-d-m--d |
| t,-,le,t,drrff | m---d--s, |
| l,-d-f--l, | s,-d-m--d |
| t,--dmr-t, | d----- |
The solfa line by line
The same solfa as plain text, easy to copy into your own notes or a WhatsApp message to the choir. To print it, download the solfa as a PDF.
Doh is Bb · 4/4
Staff notation
The melody on the treble staff in Bb major.
The staff is drawn here when you scroll to it.
About the tune
- Melody: Hawaiian Folk Tune
- Arranged (1921): B. B. McKinney (1886–1952)
Metre: Irregular.
Melody from the Christian Classics Ethereal Hymnary (CCEH, public domain); tune HE LIVES ON HIGH (Hawaiian Folk Tune). The CCEH gives its tunes as four-part scores; this page has the melody only, read from its MIDI file and checked against its incipit, and NoteFusion's engine wrote the solfa from the notes. It has not yet been checked against a printed hymn book. The arranger named above set CCEH's harmony, which is not shown here.
New to solfa? Read how to read Tonic Solfa and how to find the doh of a song.
Questions about He Lives On High
What is the doh of He Lives On High?
In this version, in Bb major, doh is Bb. If your choir sings it in another key, doh moves to the new key note and every solfa syllable stays the same — that is what movable doh means.
What note does He Lives On High start on?
It starts on s, (F in Bb major), a pickup before the first full bar. Find doh first, then sing up or down to s,.
Is He Lives On High in the public domain?
Yes. B. B. McKinney died in 1952; the tune was first published in 1921. Everyone named died before 1955 and it was published before 1929, so the tune is out of copyright in Nigeria, the UK, the EU and the United States. Modern arrangements of it can still be under copyright.