Free Christmas Sheet Music

This time of year many people are in search of free Christmas sheet music for the piano, guitar and other instruments. There are many sources for free Christmas sheet music that can be found online. The sheet music may be offered free for many reasons, including expired copyrights - which places the music in the public domain, artists who share their music free of charge, websites that are able to offer free sheet music because of advertising support, distribution under the terms of free art, creative commons licenses and various other reasons.

Here are a few popular online sources that offer all types of free sheet music, including free Christmas sheet music:

• IMSLP/The Petrucci Music Library: This virtual library contains public domain and composer shared music scores. You can search by composer, instrument genre or you can try the search feature and enter keywords such as Christmas to locate the type of sheet music you're looking for.
• The Mutopia Project: Offers sheet music editions of classical music for free download. These are based on editions in the public domain, and include works by Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, Handel, Mozart, and many others. All of the music on Mutopia may be freely downloaded, printed, copied, distributed, modified, performed and recorded. Browse the site or use the Advanced Search feature to look for Christmas sheet music.
• Free-Scores.com: Has nearly 16,000 pieces of music available to download. You can search by instrument or try using the search area to find free sheet music by the song title, etc. A general search for Christmas brings up several results.
• G Major Music Theory: This website offers free sheet music for piano, guitar and sing alongs. Selections are also organized by Christmas and Hanukkah music.
• Capotastomusic.com: Download a variety of free Christmas sheet music and stay informed by reading the blog.
• Words & Music: A site offering free popular piano sheet music arranged by the webmaster so that it creates an artistic interpretation of the song. The Popular Sheet Music selections include several well known artists and songs. The site also has a plethora of Links to Other Free Music Sheets.
• Cipoo.net: Scores published on this site are distributed under the terms of the Free Art License. The main page currently features several free Christmas sheet music options.
• Musicnotes.com: Offers a variety of free digital sheet music. Installation of the free Musicnotes software is required in order to download the music. Each month, Musicnotes offers one song for free download from their catalog of nearly 110,000 sheet music titles. It is common for free Christmas sheet music selections to be offered this time of year.
• Making Music Fun: Has a fabulous selection of free sheet music for Christmas or anytime. This fun website is great for kids and music students; it offers free printable music worksheets and much more. Thanks goes to The Piano Student for recommending this site! The Piano Student is also a great free music resource that you will love - check it out!

Most of the free Christmas sheet music is available to download and print in PDF format. Some sites allow you preview the songs by listening to them in MP3 format. Be sure to follow the rules and regulations for using the free sheet music.

photo: josterix, sxc.hu