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Bilingual Bedtime/German songs
BewegungsliedAction song

Spannenlanger Hansel.

The melody of Spannenlanger Hansel on a staff, as engraved in the book
Download the tune

The melody as written on the staff, so you can learn the tune before you sing.

  1. Spannenlanger Hansel,shpahn-nuhn-lahng-er hahn-zuhl,Hansel, a hand span long,
  2. Nudeldicke Dirn'.noo-duhl-di-kuh dirn.very plump lass.
  3. Gehen wir in Garten,gay-uhn veer in gahr-tuhn,Let us go into the garden,
  4. Schütteln wir die Birn.shewt-tuhln veer dee birn.let us shake the pears.
  5. Schüttel ich die großen,shewt-tuhl ikh dee groh-suhn,I shake the big ones,
  6. Schüttelst du die kleinen,shewt-tuhlst doo dee klai-nuhn,you shake the little ones,
  7. Wenn das Säckel voll ist,vehn dahs zeh-kuhl fol ist,when the little sack is full,
  8. Geh'n wir nach der Heimen.gayn veer nahkh dair hai-muhn.let us go home.

About this song

A harvest song for shaking pears out of the tree, printed by Böhme in 1897 as Nr. 970, Birnen schütteln, from Simrock's Das deutsche Kinderbuch of 1848. Spannenlang means a hand span long, so Hansel is tiny, not tall. Reach up and shake an imaginary branch on each Schüttel line, then stoop and gather the fallen pears.

Where it comes from

The words: Franz Magnus Böhme, Deutsches Kinderlied und Kinderspiel (Breitkopf & Härtel, 1897), S. 196.

The tune: Böhme prints no tune with this number, so the melody comes from elsewhere: de.wikipedia 'Spannenlanger Hansel', section 'Melodie und Text', the article's LilyPond score block (F major, 2/4), cited there from Ingeborg Weber-Kellermann, Das Buch der Kinderlieder (Schott, 1997 and 2010), S. 94. Every pitch and value is read off that block and the key is kept. Cross-checked note for note against a second print, the Liederprojekt sheet of Carus-Verlag and SWR2 (PDF 30254, from the Kinderlieder-Buch of Carus and Reclam, 2011), which has the same tune in the same key barred in 4/4: same pitches, same phrase shapes, same rests, same closing half note. One adaptation: both references underlay the modern words, whose lines 6 and 8 have five syllables and close on a half note, while Böhme's 'Schüttelst du die kleinen,' and 'Geh'n wir nach der Heimen.' have six; those two half notes are written as the two quarters they fill, which keeps every bar 2/4 and matches the tune's own d4 d4 and a4 a4 endings in the odd lines

From the book

Bilingual Bedtime

Thirty-Seven German Songs for Children

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Hopp, hopp, hoppAll 37 songsBrüderchen, komm tanz mit mir
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