Happy Thing of the Day

[orichalcum]

I love Christmas carols. There's a lot of darn good music this holiday season, and it warms my heart that Mac is falling in love with it and keeps requesting "cereal music" or "Crispix music" in between Dreamtheater and Yes. I wish the tradition of wassailing was still alive and well - and that I could sing, to be fair.

What is your favorite Christmas carol?

Mine is "Carol of the Bells," a perhaps unusual choice, with "Silent Night" and "Here we come A-Wassailing" probably coming in at 2 and 3.

Comments

[ladybird97.livejournal.com]

Oh, I love Carol of the Bells too! And the Boar's Head carol,which is way obscure :)

My usual Christmas-season listening is the Nutcracker, Handel's Messiah,and the Christmas Revels CDs, in rotation :)

[cerebralpaladin.livejournal.com]

The Boar's Head carol is great, although I grant that it's at least a little obscure.

[stolen-tea.livejournal.com]

Caput apri defero!

[ladybird97.livejournal.com]

Reddens laudes Domino!

[nhradar.livejournal.com]

Revels!

For me, it's Once in Royal David's City

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's cool but obscure. :)

[stolen-tea.livejournal.com]

Huh. The name seems only dimly familiar to me, but if the tune is indeed "Irby", I know I've heard that it many times before, and I can't think of any other hymns that it would go with...

[nhradar.livejournal.com]

It's slightly less obscure than it appears. It's just that it is always performed in a church setting. It is the traditional opening hymn for the King's College service of 9 lessons and carols, and so it's been adopted by many churches as the opening hymn for their carols services, as well. The way it is usually performed is as a processional, with the first verse sung as a boy's solo, and the rest of the choir progressively joining in on subsequent verses. It's very nice. I definitely recommed getting a recording of the King's College choir doing their service.

[stolen-tea.livejournal.com]

I *love* the Revels CDs. They are the music of my childhood Decembers. :)

(The first and third are my favorites...)

[thistleingrey.livejournal.com]

Dream Theater! \o/

(Sorry not to have anything of substance to say--it's been one of those days--but the only (other) person I know who's even heard of them is my college ex-bf, who was a diehard Rush fan.)

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Oh, CP loves Dream Theater - and Rush. Mac also asks frequently for "Windows!", which means he wants to hear Rush's _Power Windows_, which does indeed have a window on the cd cover.

[cerebralpaladin.livejournal.com]

My favorite is probably "O come o come Emmanuel," although technically that's more of an Advent hymn than a Christmas carol. But really, I like so many carols, it's hard to choose.

[darkforge.livejournal.com]

I don't think I'd ever heard it before; I just listened to a bit of it on YouTube. ("And ransom captive Israel"?)

[feir-fireb.livejournal.com]

The reference is not familiar? I think it's partially a reference to the Babylonian Captivity (and parallels in the Roman occupation). Much Christian reference to biblical prophecy regarding Jesus as the Messiah comes from Isaiah, which covers the Babylonian Captivity. But a significant parallel in the song that is also a common theme elsewhere is the church as the chosen people (Israel) and sin as captor.

[darkforge.livejournal.com]

I've certainly heard the expression "captive Israel" but the use of "ransom" meaning "delivery from sin" has been considerably drowned out by the meaning "to free from captivity by compensating the captor."

I'm certain I wouldn't have even thought to comment if the lyrics had said "rescue captive Israel."

[stolen-tea.livejournal.com]

I though the "compensation" was the death of Christ - God paying his own penalty so that humans could be free?

[feir-fireb.livejournal.com]

Okay. I see what you mean. Anyways, stolen_tea's basically said what I was going to.

[feir-fireb.livejournal.com]

An excellent song, one that I love very much.

[stolen-tea.livejournal.com]

"brightest and Best", I think.

[darkforge.livejournal.com]

I feel fairly confident that Carol of the Bells is not an unusual choice. I think it's the fact that most of the carols are sung as melody-only, but since the melody is so simple you kind of have to do it with multiple parts, to nice effect.

Anyway, it's probably my favorite, too.

[feir-fireb.livejournal.com]

"God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen", I think. But it changes from time to time. "Silent Night" has been near and dear for a long time. And I've long been partial to my parents' favorites, "The First Noel" and "Hark the Herald Angels Sing".

[kenjari.livejournal.com]

When I was about 5 or 6 I remember seeing the lyrics to "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" in a book. I misread "save us all from Satan's power" as "save us all from Santa's power" and being very confused.

[emilymorgan.livejournal.com]

That's wonderful!

[stolen-tea.livejournal.com]

I always liked "Hark the Herald Angels" because of the jaunty tune and the key we played it in (I think F major).

[retsuko.livejournal.com]

For "serious" songs, I love hearing "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas", even though I really don't care for snow.

For silly songs, I really love "Deck Us All With Boston Charlie".

[stolen-tea.livejournal.com]

Walla walla wash, and Kalamazoo!

[cerebralpaladin.livejournal.com]

It's awesome that many of us know Deck us all with Boston Charlie. Although I usually mangle it-- my Dad, otoh, knows both verses.

[stolen-tea.livejournal.com]

My father has several of the old Pogo books; they were falling apart even when I was little, but they were some of my favorites, although I now realize a lot of the political commentary went straight over my head. :)

I used to know both verses, but now only have the first...

[digitalemur.livejournal.com]

I had a teacher in high school who brought us Pogo books to read, and taught us all Deck Us All With Boston Charlie, not that any of us can remember it now. One of the beautiful things about college was meeting people who, as he warned me would eventually happen, also knew that!

Happy memories!

[digitalemur.livejournal.com]

Yes, this means you are the people the grownups warned me about. :)

[cookie107.livejournal.com]

I love "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen"--especially the BNL version! I'm getting to sing a solo for church the Sunday after Christmas and was allowed to choose any carol I wanted (except "O Holy Night", which is reserved for Christmas Eve, bummer for me) and I've chosen "Mary's Little Boy Child", which is growing on me. You Tube doesn't do it justice--Charlotte Church's version is the only one I like even a little. To clarify, I'll be in a Lutheran Church in MA--my version will not be Calypso or disco.