Land of the Silver Birch arr. by Peter Hudson

As mentioned in a previous post, I have done a few searches for Peter Hudson and haven’t turned up anything about him as a composer or player. I know that he has done a number of arrangements for the Royal Conservatory series. This leads me to believe he is a native of Canada and works in the system somehow. If anyone knows of any information about him, then I’d be more than happy to have it. But without such information, let’s get to the song presented here, Land of the Silver Birch.

Land of the Silver Birch is a traditional Canadian folk song that dates from the 1920s.^[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_of_the_Silver_Birch The lyrics appear to focus on the vision of the land by indigenous peoples. The most famous version of the song came from Bonnie Dobson’s 1972 self-titled album.

Publications of Land of the Silver Birch

The arrangement of this piece only appears in the Royal Conservatory series from before 2018. This is the series that I used to teach and perform the piece. The current series does not have the arrangement included.

About The Piece

Land of the Silver Birch retains its traditional key of A natural minor. The melody is simple and remains in the upper voice throughout. The right hand consistently plays simultaneously with the fingers. This gives a beginning student excellent work on this type of coordination for later pieces. There exists very little change in the rhythm with only the three measures (13-15 and 29-31) before each ending cadence containing eighth notes.

Chadwick Becks

I have two degrees in guitar performance and was privileged to study under Aaron Shearer, Tom Kikta, David Skantar, Ken Karsh, Tim Bedner, and currently Christopher Berg. Outside my editorial work on this blog, I teach full-time across many genres including classical, jazz, blues, rock, funk, and metal.