First Note Music Tunes
All the works on this website by the composer and renowned member of Radio 4 panel show "I’m Sorry I Haven't A Clue" Colin Sell, and his collaborator, lyricist Chris Lowe, have put onto the site a number of light-hearted song cycles for choirs to perform free of charge.​
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​For further information email Administrator at
DIRECTORS OF CHOIRS
The FNMT website contains a number of cantatas and individual songs for directors of choirs, music groups, schools, further education and higher education institutes and amateur choirs to perform the works free of charge.
Click on SONGBOOK above to see the range of materials available - Scores, Videos and Recordings.
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COMPOSERS AND WRITERS
The First Note Music Tunes (FNMT) website presents an opportunity for composers and lyricists to make their works available to performers and anyone else interested in new compositions.
You can display (free of charge) piano scores, and lyrics plus videos of the music being played on instruments or electronically.
Committed to supporting music-making, performance and creative writing in the community.
Our Mission
Young peoples' musical journey starts from the very 'First Note.'
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Helping young people and adults discover their inner musician, writers and voices.
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Enabling teachers and musical professionals to enhance the experience of music for young people and in local communities.
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Promoting music, writing and performance in the UK and around the world.
Our music projects
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Class Act​
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Colin Sell’s joyful setting of Chris Lowe’s witty songs telling the story of how children’s right to free school education was enacted by Parliament even while war raged in Normandy in summer 1944.
The varying styles and moods convey both the pathos and humour of the time.
Class Act is suitable for secondary schools, youth and adult choirs but there is much that will be a joy for primary schools to join in.
We hope choirs around the UK will appreciate the gesture and mark the importance of the reform by singing Class Act …. fortissimo
Lasts about 20 minutes.
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Carmina Comica: The Antidote To Choral Cantatas
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Five songs tracing the history of choral music in a cheerful and sometimes irreverent manner. The cantata includes a unique spoof madrigal in Anglo Roman patois Latin which invites choirs to sing themselves into a surreal comic world!
Suitable for choirs of all abilities.
Lasts about 35 minutes.
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Away From The Manger: Whatever happened to the Christmas supporting cast
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Another Lowe and Sell light-hearted cantata with gloriously witty tunes. The songs explore what might have happened to the Christmas shepherds, the Bethlehem innkeeper, the animals in the Manger, and the somewhat puzzled Magi . It features an amazing argument between the three Kings and the three wise men as to who are the real Magi. It takes a band of Angels to resolve it.
Suitable for choirs of all abilities.
Lasts about 40 minutes.
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Starting Out: A School Oratorio
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A series of 14 songs for primary and early secondary school pupils about school life - from the first song Start of the Day to The End of Term and final Afternoon Hymn when the empty school erupts with ghosts and ghouls and strange goings-on.
Suitable for Years 5 to 10
Lasts over around 45 minutes if all songs are sung.​
