HIGH NOTES & LOW NOTES

 

Unless one lives on a remote Hebridean island – and there is no guarantee even there – we cannot avoid certain music at this time of the year. Whether one listens to King’s College, Cambridge on the radio, or simply pops down to the stores for a bit of shopping, Christmas music is wall-to-wall, aisle-to-aisle everywhere. From the obscure medieval French carols, through the popular ones we all know, to the American croons of the mid-20^th century – to the unforgivable pop tunes that blast out a commercial message as autumn cools into winter.

 

Please, I am not channeling Ebeneezer Scrooge. I enjoy good music, and I know the power of music to lift heart and soul with the announcement of Christmas, which, by the way, is “Incarnatus Est” – and not, “All I Want For Christmas Is You.”

 

Yet even the classical carol or chorus, the middle or even highbrow music, often makes me smile. We know the tunes. We remember (most of) the words perhaps because we sang them in school. And at a time of the year when emotions run deep for many of us, we lean on them to find a source of traditional and comfort. There is nothing wrong with that. But do we actually listen to the words, understand the story behind them – or even know where they came from? Please indulge me in a very lighthearted tour of a mere handful of these refrains and rhapsodies, and accept my notes and footnotes, without disrespect to composers or authors, known or unknown. Music, maestro, please!

We three kings of orient are
Bearing gifts we traverse afar
Field and fountain
Moor and mountain
Following yonder star

 

This wonderful American carol – which, by right, belongs to the Epiphany and not Christmas – was written by the Episcopal priest John Henry Hopkin Jr. in 1857. It is jolly, it is singable – especially the ribald chorus after wine – and it attempts to lyricize the events described in Matthew’s gospel. The problem is: These mysterious visitors from the East were not kings. In the Greek text of that gospel, they are described as “magi.” Seers, astrologers, even Zoroastrian priests. But you see, all that does not make for a good seasonal jingle.

I saw three ships come sailing in
⁠On Christmas day, on Christmas day;
I saw three ships come sailing in
⁠On Christmas day in the morning.

 

I love this old English carol. It was first recorded by the publisher William Sandys in 1833, but the words probably go back a century or two before. It sings of ships sailing into Bethlehem. Now for all I know, and I did not see one when I was there, Bethlehem does not have a deep-water harbour. So, what on earth is this carol all about? (Clue. It is not about camels, those “ships of the desert.” That is a recent suggestion.) The truth is it is enigmatic. We do not know. There is a suggestion that it refers to a 12^th century legend of the remains of the Magi (see above carol) being taken by ship to Cologne cathedral. But that fact we don’t know shouldn’t spoil our sing.

The Carol of the Bells. Beautiful tune. Popularised by its endless playing by the new UK radio station Classic FM in the 1980s. It’s based on an Ukrainian New Year folk legend. The composer was the Ukrainian Mykola Leontovych, and the English word written by the American composer Peter Wilhousky. Haunting, if repetitive. And, if one is honest, devoid of meaning.

When Joseph was an old man, an old man was he
He married virgin Mary, the queen of Galilee
He married virgin Mary, the queen of Galilee.

 

Enchanting. Old. Very old. Could be in the 1400s. A legend of Joseph and Mary stopping off in a cherry orchard on their way down from Nazareth to Bethlehem, and they had a bit of a tiff that the unborn Jesus sorted out. And why not?  But, hang on! What’s this? Why is there an assumption that Joseph was old? Older than Mary, yes. By the practice of the day Mary would have been in her mid-teens when betrothed (and, please, let us not project our 21^st century norms onto that,) but that’s all we can assume.

Did you realise that the Hallelujah Chorus, so beloved of American choir performances at Christmastide, is the climax to the work celebrating Christ’s Passion, death, and resurrection. That is why its unofficial title is the Easter Oratorio?

Last, but never least, Jingle Bells (which, in my shopping meanderings this week I must have hear more than a dozen time,) was not originally a Christmas song. Written for a Thanksgiving celebration in 1857, and entitled “One Horse Open Sleigh,” by the Massachusetts musician James Lord Pierpont – now there’s a WASP name – it was first rehearsed by a Sunday School group abed then became locally popular as a tavern drinking song. To think the Southern Baptists still sing it!

Let us now stand to sing…