Watchman: hymn tune in Tonic Solfa
Watchman, the hymn tune by Lowell Mason, in Tonic Solfa (doh is D): 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
- D major
- Doh
- D
- Time
- 6/4
- Starts on
- d (D)
- Range
- d to d' (D to D, an octave)
- Metre
- 7.7.7.7
- Music
- Lowell Mason
- Also called
- Antiphonal Hymn
Melody from the Christian Classics Ethereal Hymnary (CCEH, public domain); tune WATCHMAN by Lowell Mason (1792–1872). Sources and licences.
The solfa
| d---r-m---r- | m---f-s----- |
| s---m-s---l- | s---m-r----- |
| d---r-m---r- | m---f-s----- |
| d'---l-s---r- | m---r-d----- |
| s---m-d'---l- | s---m-d'----- |
| s---m-d'---l- | t---l-s----- |
| m---r-d---r- | m---f-s----- |
| d'---l-s---r- | m---r-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 D · 6/4
Staff notation
The melody on the treble staff in D major.
The staff is drawn here when you scroll to it.
About the tune
- Music (1830): Lowell Mason (1792–1872)
Metre: 7.7.7.7. Hymns on this site in the same metre: Holy Ghost, with Light Divine, Now the Light Has Gone Away, Take My Life and Let It Be.
Melody from the Christian Classics Ethereal Hymnary (CCEH, public domain); tune WATCHMAN by Lowell Mason (1792–1872). 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.
New to solfa? Read how to read Tonic Solfa and how to find the doh of a song.
Questions about Watchman
What is the doh of Watchman?
In this version, in D major, doh is D. 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 Watchman start on?
It starts on d (D in D major). Find doh first, then sing up or down to d.
What words can be sung to Watchman?
Watchman is in the metre 7.7.7.7: lines of 7, 7, 7, 7 syllables. Words written in the same metre fit it, such as Holy Ghost, with Light Divine, Now the Light Has Gone Away, Take My Life and Let It Be; check where the stresses fall before you sing them together.
Is Watchman in the public domain?
Yes. Lowell Mason died in 1872; the tune was first published in 1830. 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.