Closet Accordion Players of America

Joy to the World Polka

 

If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. That may have been my thinking many years ago when I started playing what I think of as my “polka game.” Since people were always assuming that polkas are the only kind of music that I (or any accordionist) can play, I decided to turn everything into a polka.

Goofing around, I’d ask someone to name a song that definitely was not a polka. If I knew the melody, I’d “polka-ize” it: “Hey Jude Polka.” “God Bless America Polka.” “Sounds of Silence Polka.” You get the idea. It was a goofy bit of fun, and people seemed to love it.

           
The other day I was thinking about Christmas carols and decided to pick one and create a polka version to share with CAPA members. I decided on “Joy to the World.”

I really, really loved my first version, which at one point morphed into the “fishes in the deep blue sea” portion of Three Dog Night’s Joy to the World.” Though it made me laugh, I had to give it up so as not to run afoul of copyright issues. Instead, I substituted a bit of Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus,” which has been safely in public domain for more than 250 years.
 

So, just for fun, here’s the music for the “Joy to the World Polka.”  Sadly, after creating it, I discovered that it's not possible to add a downloadable pdf to the website. Sigh. However, I'm happy to send a pdf of the music, individually, to any CAPA member who emails a request to the website email address.

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If you don’t play (and some CAPA members do not), you can hear a quick and imperfect cell phone recording of it here. You can also watch a video of the Vancouver Squeezebox Circle playing the song.