PlaysoloistStringsViolinSongsMolly Malone (Cockles and Mussels)

violin song · Strings

Molly Malone (Cockles and Mussels) Violin Sheet Music & Notes

Composer
Traditional
Year
Key
C
Time
3/4
Tempo
116 BPM
Difficulty
Beginner · ★
First note
C4

Molly Malone (Cockles and Mussels) on violin

The full melody, rendered as engraved treble-clef staff you can read on screen or print for the stand — free, and never truncated.

34

Trad. Irish, 19th c. — public domain.

How to practise this on violin

Molly Malone (Cockles and Mussels) is written in C and opens on C4, so tune that string true before you draw a bow — on a fretless fingerboard the whole piece rides on where your first finger lands. Play the opening phrase slowly, one clean bow-stroke per note, and watch the pitch feedback rather than your hand: the app hears which notes drifted sharp or flat, which is the one thing a mirror can never show you.

Keep the bow parallel to the bridge and draw from the middle third for an even tone. Set the metronome well under around 116 BPM and don't raise it until you've been graded clean on two takes in a row. When a bar comes back red, loop just that bar — intonation improves fastest on the phrase you keep missing, not on replaying the whole piece from the top. By the numbers, this setting runs 59 notes across 26 bars, from B3 up to A4 in 3/4 time.

Also playable on

The same melody is graded across 6 Playsoloist instruments. See every version, with difficulty and provenance, on the Molly Malone (Cockles and Mussels) cross-instrument hub.

Keep exploring

Free on the App Store

Play Molly Malone (Cockles and Mussels) — and hear every note graded.

Soloist Violin reads this engraved treble-clef staff under the notation and grades your take on-device, note by note — free on iPhone, no ads, no account.

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