Page 194 - Voice for Life Songbook 1

35. He’s got the whole world in his hands
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Track 35
Information
This is an arrangement of the well-known spiritual ‘He’s got the whole world in his hands’ with a twist. During the course of the song your singers will sing the melody in various musical styles: blues, swing and in canon.
Preparation
To prepare your singers for the introduction to this piece, begin with this rhythm game. Divide them into three teams and give them each a number from two to four.While you clap four beats in a bar ask each of your teams to call out their number on the appropriate beat of the bar.Then, introducing one group at a time, ask them to replace the spoken numbers with the following voice parts:
 
    He's got
 
   
 

   He's got
He's got

He's got
Only add in the syncopated fourth part when the first three parts are secure.
You can then play around, removing some of the parts and leaving others going to see if they can keep the rhythm secure and keep a steady sense of pulse going throughout the game. Set up start and stop signals to encourage your singers to watch the conductor to see when to sing and when to stop.
Teaching the song
Having used the preparation game, look at the introduction with your singers and mark in the beats where each of the ‘He’s got’ entries lies.Then have a go at putting this together.
The melody at bars 17–24 is very much like the original so you could start by singing through this section first.The next section at bars 28–35 is very similar except that the rhythm has been slightly altered so that the fifth note of each phrase is lengthened.Ask your singers to lean on this note to help them remember that they must lengthen it: ‘He’s got the sun and the moon’. Now divide your singers into two parts so they can sing the melody in canon (bars 37–45).
At this point, go back to the first rendition of the melody during bars 7–13.This is very much like the original melody except that there are a couple of unexpected rests. One comes before the word ‘world’ and the other before ‘in his hands’. If your singers have trouble with this rhythm ask them to imagine
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