George Washington Bridge

We think you're going to love this song for the challenge it offers your singers. The concept is fairly simple – just sing the words "George Washington Bridge" over and over to a very recognizable and familiar tune. Sounds easy, right? The challenge is that, no matter where a syllable falls, you must keep singing the next. None of the words are slurred. So, oftentimes you will end up on a "wash" or an "ing" or a "ton." If you read along in the music, it will be a bit easier, but once your singers get used to it, try having them sing without the music for an extra challenge. Whether used as a warm-up, warm-down, or focus moment, your singers will have a lot of fun with it.

Ukuleles!

In case the singing doesn't provide enough of a challenge, we also made this tune a ukulele feature. You could have a group doing the singing and a group doing the ukulele playing. Of course, you could just make this a choir feature, or use the tracks and make it just a ukulele feature. The chords used are G, C, and D7. Note that we have provided two ways to play the D7. One is the more traditional version and is a bit more difficult to play. The other isn't exactly a D7 (it uses the notes F#, A, and C), but fits nicely in the tune and is much easier to play. As usual, we have provided a written uke part in the score, but we also encourage your players to freely strum along, if they are so inclined. A PDF of the extracted part is also available on our web site.

The melody for this song may be very familiar. It almost sounds like a classic waltz by the German composer Johann Strauss and has often been attributed to him. But actually, it is a tune called "Sobre las olas" (over the waves) and was written by Mexican composer Juventino Rosas in 1888.