History of the Carols in the Festival of Carols
Once in Royal David’s City
As a small girl, Cecil Frances Humphries (1818-1895) wrote poetry in her school's journal. In 1850, she married Rev. William Alexander, who later became the Anglican primate (chief bishop) of Ireland. She showed her concern for disadvantaged people by traveling many miles each day to visit the sick and the poor, providing food, warm clothes, and medical supplies. She and her sister also founded a school for the deaf. Alexander was strongly influenced by the Oxford Movement and by John Keble's Christian Year. Her first book of poetry, Verses for Seasons, was a "Christian Year" for children. She wrote hymns based on the Apostles' Creed, baptism, the Lord's Supper, the Ten Commandments, and prayer, writing in simple language for children. Her more than four hundred hymn texts were published in Verses from the Holy Scripture ( 1846), Hymns for Little Children (1848), and Hymns Descriptive and Devotional (1858).
Hymns for Little Children contained thirteen hymns written to explain phrases from the Apostles' Creed. One of these was “Once in Royal David's City,” which elaborates on the phrases “who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary.” Each stanza explores part of the contrast between Jesus' divinity and humanity. The first stanza contrasts the grand idea of “royal David's city” with the lowliness of a cattle-shed, and the second, the glory of heaven, from where He came, with the poverty of earth to which He came. The hymn ends by reminding us that Christ has ascended once again to glory, where we shall see Him, as He said: “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am” (John 14:3 NIV).
The English composer Henry J. Gauntlett (1805-1876) wrote the hymn tune IRBY, which was first published in the Evangelical Lutheran Hymnal, 1908.
Since 1919, the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols at the King's College Chapel Cambridge has begun its Christmas Eve service, with Dr. Arthur Henry Mann's arrangement of "Once in Royal David's City" as the Processional hymn.
O Come, all Ye Faithful
The original text of “O Come, All Ye Faithful” has been from attributed to various groups and individuals, including St. Bonaventure in the 13th century or King John IV of Portugal in the 17th, though it was more commonly believed that the text was written by an order of monks, the Cistercian, German, Portuguese and Spanish orders having, at various times, been given credit.
The original text consisted of four Latin verses, and it was with these that the hymn was originally published. John Francis Wade (1711=1786) had written the music and the hymn in Latin in 1744, and was first published in 1751. The Abbé Jean-François-Étienne Borderies wrote an additional three verses in the 18th century; these are normally printed as the third to fifth of seven verses, while another, anonymous, additional Latin verse is rarely printed. The text has been translated innumerable times, but the most used version today is the English "O Come, All Ye Faithful". This is a combination of one of Frederick Oakeley's translations of the original four verses and William Thomas Brooke's of the three additional ones, which was first published in Murray's Hymnal in 1852. Oakeley originally titled the song “Ye Faithful, approach ye” when it was sung at his Margaret Church in Marylebone before it was altered to its current form.
O Come, O Come, Emmanuel
O come, O come, Emmanuel is a Christian hymn for Advent. While it is most commonly known by that English title, it is in fact a translation of the original Latin, Veni, Veni, Emmanuel; translations into other modern languages (particularly German) are also in widespread use. The 1861 translation from Hymns Ancient and Modern is the most prominent by far in the English-speaking world, but other English translations also exist. The hymn is a metrical paraphrase of the O Antiphons, a series of plainchant antiphons attached to the Magnificat at Vespers over the final days before Christmas. The words and the music of "O come, O come, Emmanuel" developed separately. The Latin text is first documented in Germany in 1710, whereas the tune most familiar in the English-speaking world has its origins in 15th-century France.
The pre-history of the text stretches back to the origins of the O Antiphons, which were in existence by, at the latest, the eighth century. They were paraphrased extensively by the English poet Cynewulf in a poem written before the year 800. While "O come, O come, Emmanuel" is often linked with the 12th century, the earliest surviving evidence of the hymn's text is in the seventh edition of Psalteriolum Cantionum Catholicarum, which was published in Cologne in 1710. That hymnal was a major force in the history of German church music: first assembled by Jesuit hymnographer Johannes Herringsdorf in 1610 and receiving numerous revised editions through 1868, it achieved enormous impact due to its use in Jesuit schools.
The text of the Psalteriolum Cantionum Catholicarum version is essentially expanded, rather than altered, over the subsequent centuries. That version exhibits all of the hymn's characteristic qualities: it is strophic and metrical, and the order is altered so that the last of the O Antiphons (the titular "Veni Emmanuel") becomes the first verse of the hymn. Each stanza consists of a four-line verse, which adapts one of the antiphons, and a new two-line refrain ("Gaude, gaude! Emmanuel \ nascetur pro te, Israel," i.e. "Rejoice, Rejoice, Emmanuel \ Shall come to thee, O Israel"), which provides an explicitly Advent-oriented response to the petition of the verse.
The familiar tune called Veni Emmanuel was first linked with this hymn in 1851, when Thomas Helmore published it in the Hymnal Noted, paired with an early revision of Neale's English translation of the text. The volume listed the tune as being "From a French Missal in the National Library, Lisbon." The pairing of the hymn text with the Veni Emmanuel tune was an extremely significant combination. The hymn text was embraced both out of a Romantic interest in poetic beauty and medieval exoticism and out of a concern for matching hymns to liturgical seasons and functions rooted in the Oxford Movement in the Church of England. The Hymnal Noted, in which the words and tune were first combined, represented these goals. This hymnal consisted entirely of versions of Latin hymns, designed for use as Office hymns within the Anglican Church despite the fact that Office hymns had no part in the authorized liturgy. The music was drawn chiefly from plainchant, as was the case with the Veni Emmanuel tune for "O Come, O Come Emmanuel.”
Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus
Charles Wesley wrote “Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus” and printed it in his Hymns for the Nativity of our Lord (1744). Like so many of Wesley's texts, "Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus" alludes to one or more Scripture passages in virtually every phrase. The double nature of Advent is reflected in this text, in which we remember Christ's first coming even while praying for his return. Stanzas 1 and 2 recall Advent prophecies in the Old Testament; stanza 3 speaks of Christ's birth and kingdom, and stanza 4 is a prayer for Christ's rule in our hearts.
We express longing when we sing the words of Charles Wesley’s beautiful Advent hymn, for though we know that Christ goes with us and before us every day, we long for the day when we are with Him in all of the fullness and glory He will bring. We long for the day when we are with Him in a New Heaven and New Earth, when all things are made new. And just as a four-year-old crawls into his father’s arms after an extended absence, so too we long for the day when we will be at rest in Christ, enfolded in the embrace of our Savior.
HYFRYDOL is a Welsh hymn tune that appears in a number of Christian hymnals in various arrangements. Composed by Rowland Prichard, it was originally published in the composer's handbook to the children's songbook Cyfaill y Cantorion ("The Singers' Friend"). Prichard composed the tune before he was twenty years old. The best-known arrangement is probably that by Ralph Vaughan Williams, which he originally produced for his revision of the English Hymnal, and is the version which appears in our hymnal.
My Soul Doth Magnify the Lord
The Magnificat (Latin for "[My soul] magnifies [the Lord]") is a canticle, also known as the Song of Mary, the Canticle of Mary and, in the Byzantine tradition, the Ode of the Theotokos. It is traditionally incorporated into the liturgical services of the Catholic Church (at vespers) and of the Eastern Orthodox churches (at the morning services). It is one of the eight most ancient Christian hymns and perhaps the earliest Marian hymn. Its name comes from the incipit of the Latin version of the canticle's text.
The text of the canticle is taken directly from the Gospel of Luke (1:46–55) where it is spoken by Mary upon the occasion of her Visitation to her cousin Elizabeth. In the narrative, after Mary greets Elizabeth, who is pregnant with John the Baptist, the latter moves within Elizabeth's womb. Elizabeth praises Mary for her faith (using words partially reflected in the Hail Mary), and Mary responds with what is now known as the Magnificat.
Within the whole of Christianity, the Magnificat is most frequently recited within the Liturgy of the Hours. In Western Christianity, the Magnificat is most often sung or recited during the main evening prayer service: Vespers in the Catholic and Lutheran churches, and Evening Prayer (or Evensong) in Anglicanism. In Eastern Christianity, the Magnificat is usually sung at Sunday Matins. Among Protestant groups, the Magnificat may also be sung during worship services, especially in the Advent season during which these verses are traditionally read.
Mary's Magnificat, recorded only in Luke's Gospel, is one of four hymns, distilled from a collection of early Jewish-Christian canticles, which complement the promise-fulfillment theme of Luke's infancy narrative. These songs are Mary's Magnificat; Zechariah's Benedictus (1:67–79); the angels' Gloria in Excelsis Deo (2:13–14); and Simeon's Nunc dimittis (2:28–32). In form and content, these four canticles are patterned on the "hymns of praise" in Israel's Psalter. In structure, these songs reflect the compositions of pre-Christian contemporary Jewish hymnology. The canticle echoes several biblical passages, but the most pronounced allusions are to the Song of Hannah, from the Books of Samuel (1 Samuel 2:1–10). Scriptural echoes from the Torah, the Prophets, and the Writings complement the main allusions to Hannah's "magnificat of rejoicing”. Along with the Benedictus, as well as several Old Testament canticles, the Magnificat is included in the Book of Odes, an ancient liturgical collection found in some manuscripts of the Septuagint.
In a style reminiscent of Old Testament poetry and song, Mary praises the Lord in alignment with this structure: Mary rejoices that she has the privilege of giving birth to the promised Messiah (Luke 1:46–48); She glorifies God for His power, holiness, and mercy (Luke 1:49–50); Mary looks forward to God transforming the world through the Messiah. The proud will be brought low, and the humble will be lifted up; the hungry will be fed, and the rich will go without (Luke 1:51–53); Mary exalts God because He has been faithful to His promise to Abraham (Luke 1:54–55; see God’s promise to Abraham in Gen 12:1-3).
Away in a Manger
The origin of this popular Christmas hymn is shrouded in apocryphal associations with Martin Luther (1483-1546). Methodist hymnologist Fred Gealy (1894-1976) noted that “evidence suggests that [“Away in a Manger”] is wholly an American product. The original two-stanza form probably originated among German Lutherans in Pennsylvania about 1885.” The hymn first appeared with two stanzas in Little Children’s Book for Schools and Families, a Sunday school collection published in 1885 by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in North America.
Stanza three first appeared unattributed in Gabriel’s Vineyard Songs (1892), compiled by gospel composer Charles H. Gabriel (1856-1932). Gealy conjectured “the song may have been contributed by an editor or publisher who thought the two narrative stanzas needed to be supplemented by a prayer.”
The only German version of the carol is clearly a translation from the English because the metrics are not natural to the German language. Furthermore, this version was first included in Herbert W. Werneke’s Christmas Songs and Weihnachts-Lieder (1934), a privately published collection. The false association between “Away in a Manger” and Luther appears to have been made by James R. Murray (1841-1905), who in his Dainty Songs for Little Lads and Lasses (1887) called it “‘Luther’s Cradle Hymn,’ composed by Martin Luther for his children and still sung by German mothers to their little ones.” However, no one has uncovered an original German version by the reformer. Theophilus Baker Stork (1814-1874) wrote Luther at Home (1872), in which he stated, “Luther’s carol for Christmas, written for his own child Hans, is still sung.” The irony of this assertion is that we actually have a Luther hymn that may have been written for young Hans, “Von Himmel hoch da komm ich her” (1531), published in Joseph Klug’s Gesangsbuch (1535).
O Little Town of Bethlehem
“O Little Town of Bethlehem” is a popular Christmas carol. The text was written by Phillips Brooks (1835–1893), an Episcopal priest, Rector of the Church of the Holy Trinity, Philadelphia. He was inspired by visiting the Palestinian city of Bethlehem in 1865. “After an early dinner, we took our horses and rode to Bethlehem,” he wrote home in Christmas week of 1865. “It was only about two hours when we came to the town, situated on an eastern ridge of a range of hills, surrounded by its terraced gardens. It is a good-looking town, better built than any other we have seen in Palestine. . . . Before dark, we rode out of town to the field where they say the shepherds saw the star. It is a fenced piece of ground with a cave in it (all the Holy Places are caves here), in which, strangely enough, they put the shepherds. The story is absurd, but somewhere in those fields we rode through the shepherds must have been. . . . As we passed, the shepherds were still “keeping watch over their flocks or leading them home to fold.” Three years later, he wrote the poem for his church and his organist, Lewis Redner, added the music.
Silent Night
Over 180 years ago the carol "Stille Nacht! Heilige Nacht" was heard for the first time in a village church in Oberndorf, Austria. The congregation at that Midnight Mass in St. Nicholas Church listened as the voices of the assistant pastor, Fr. Joseph Mohr (1792-1848), and the choir director, Franz Xaver Gruber (1787-1863), rang through the church to the accompaniment of Fr. Mohr's guitar. On that Christmas Eve, a song was born that would wing its way into the hearts of people throughout the world. Now translated into hundreds of languages, it is sung by untold millions every December from small chapels in the Andes to great cathedrals in Antwerp and Rome.
Today books, films and Internet sites are filled with fanciful tales purporting to tell the history of "Silent Night." Some tell of mice eating the bellows of the organ creating the necessity for a hymn to be accompanied by a guitar. Others claim that Joseph Mohr was forced to write the words to a new carol in haste since the organ would not play. A recent film, created for Austrian television places Oberndorf in the Alps and includes evil railroad barons and a double-dealing priest, while a recent book by a German author places a zither in the hands of Franz Gruber and connects Joseph Mohr with a tragic fire engulfing the city of Salzburg. You can read claims that "Silent Night" was sung on Christmas Eve in 1818 and then forgotten by its creators. Of course, the latter are easily discounted by manuscript arrangements of the carol by both Mohr and Gruber which were produced at various times between 1820 and 1855.
The German words for the original six stanzas of the carol we know as "Silent Night" were written by Joseph Mohr in 1816, when he was a young priest assigned to a pilgrimage church in Mariapfarr, Austria. His grandfather lived nearby, and it is easy to imagine that he could have come up with the words while walking thorough the countryside on a visit to his elderly relative. The fact is, we have no idea if any particular event inspired Joseph Mohr to pen his poetic version of the birth of the Christchild. The world is fortunate, however, that he didn't leave it behind when he was transferred to Oberndorf the following year (1817). On December 24, 1818 Joseph Mohr journeyed to the home of musician-schoolteacher Franz Gruber who lived in an apartment over the schoolhouse in nearby Arnsdorf. He showed his friend the poem and asked him to add a melody and guitar accompaniment so that it could be sung at Midnight Mass. His reason for wanting the new carol is unknown. Some speculate that the organ would not work; others feel that the assistant pastor, who dearly loved guitar music, merely wanted a new carol for Christmas. Later that evening, as the two men, backed by the choir, stood in front of the main altar in St. Nicholas Church and sang "Stille Nacht! Heilige Nacht!" for the first time, they could hardly imagine the impact their composition would have on the world.
Karl Mauracher, a master organ builder and repairman from the Ziller Valley, traveled to Oberndorf to work on the organ, several times in subsequent years. While doing his work in St. Nicholas, he obtained a copy of the composition and took it home with him. Thus, the simple carol, began its journey around the world as a "Tyrolean Folk Song."
Two traveling families of folk singers from the Ziller Valley, similar to the Trapp Family Singers of "The Sound of Music" fame, incorporated the song into their repertoire. According to the Leipziger Tageblatt, the Strassers sang the song in a concert in Leipzig in December 1832. It was during this period, several musical notes were changed, and the carol evolved into the melody we know today. On another occasion, according to an historical plaque, the Rainer Family sang the Christmas carol before an audience which included Emperor Franz I and Tsar Alexander I. In the year 1839, the Rainers performed "Stille Nacht" for the first time in America, at the Alexander Hamilton Monument outside Trinity Church in New York City.
Joseph Bletzacher, the Court Opera singer from Hannover, reported that by the 1840s, the carol was already well known in Lower Saxony. "In Berlin," he says, "the Royal Cathedral Choir popularized it especially. It became in fact the favorite Christmas carol of the artistically appreciative King Frederick William IV of Prussia, who used to have the Cathedral Choir sing it for him during the Christmas season each year." During his lifetime, Franz Xaver Gruber produced a number of orchestral arrangements of his composition. The original guitar arrangement is missing, but five other Gruber manuscripts of the carol exist. The manuscript by Joseph Mohr (ca. 1820) is for guitar accompaniment and is probably the closest to the arrangement and melody sung at Midnight Mass in 1818.
Perhaps this is part of the miracle of "Silent Night." The words flowed from the imagination of a modest curate. The music was composed by a musician who was not known outside his village. There was no celebrity to sing at its world premiere. Yet its powerful message of heavenly peace has crossed all borders and language barriers, conquering the hearts of people everywhere.
Angels We Have Heard on High
"Angels We Have Heard on High" is a Christmas carol of French origin in the public domain. The song commemorates the story of the birth of Jesus Christ found in the Gospel of Luke, in which shepherds outside Bethlehem encounter a multitude of angels singing and praising the newborn child. People began to chant the phrase "Gloria in excelsis Deo" in Christmas Eve worship services as early as 130 A.D. In medieval times, French shepherds had a Christmas Eve tradition of shouting "Gloria in excelsis Deo" to each other as they watched over their sheep flocks on their respective hills in southern France. A Latin chorale version may have inspired the traditional French Christmas carol 'Les Anges dans nos Campagnes,' which Edward Shippen Barnes used in the 1800s to arrange the first version of 'Angels We Have Heard on High'. The most common English version that was translated in 1862 by James Chadwick, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Hexham and Newcastle, northeast England. 'Angels We Have Heard on High' was first published in English as part of an 1862 book called Crown of Jesus Music. But the version that has become popular worldwide was published later, in 1916, in the book Carols Old and Carols New.
GLORIA is the French noel tune traditionally associated with this text. The popularity of this carol stems from its refrain–all those cascading phrases in which human beings imitate the angels' chorus. The tune is also known as IRIS because of its association with James Montgomery's "Angels from the Realms of Glory", which was first printed in the Sheffield Iris (Montgomery, ed.). The harmonization is by Edward S. Barnes (1887-1958) and was first published in The New Church Hymnal (1937). Barnes studied at the Lawrenceville School, Yale University, and the Schola Cantorum in Paris. He was organist and choirmaster at two New York City churches – Church of the Incarnation and Rutgers Presbyterian – and in Philadelphia at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church. From 1938 to 1954 he served as organist at the First Presbyterian Church in Santa Monica, California. Barnes contributed to the Presbyterian Handbook to the Hymnal (1935) and wrote piano and vocal works as well as anthems and liturgical music.
Hark, the Herald Angels Sing
The carol we now know as "Hark! the herald angels sing" did not start life as such, and required at least four people to bring it to its current form. Wesley's original, written as a Christmas Day hymn and first published in 1739, is made up of ten four-line verses, rather than the longer eight-line verses with refrain which we have now. It is interesting to note that in the original version of Wesley's, the heavens ring with the phrase "Glory to the King of kings," echoing Luke's "Glory to God in the highest heaven." George Whitfield, who had been a student with Wesley, changed this to "Glory to the newborn King" in 1753. His fairly revolutionary Calvinist position was not compatible with Wesley's gentler reforming approach, which eventually bore fruit in the Methodist movement that he and his brother John inspired, Whitfield maintained the four-line verses of Wesley's original, but changed the angels' emphasis: "Glory to the newborn King" means something slightly but significantly different from "Glory to the King of kings." In the Gospel account, the angels praise God, whereas in "Hark! the herald angels sing," they are inaccurately described as praising Jesus. Furthermore, Luke does not say that the angels "sing," and so it may well be that this reinterpretation by Whitfield has emphasized the popular but unscriptural picture of angels singing the Gloria. ("While shepherds watched" also implies that they sang.)
The familiar tune, MENDELSSOHN, is an adaptation of a melody from Felix Mendelssohn’s Festgesang for male chorus and orchestra.
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