“While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks by Night“
by Nahum Tate and Alan Gray
Sung by The Seminar “Music and Poetry in Elizabethan and Jacobean England“
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WHILE shepherds watched their flocks by night,
All seated on the ground,
The angel of the Lord came down,
And glory shone around.
‘Fear not,’ said he (for mighty dread
Had seized their troubled mind);
‘Glad tidings of great joy I bring
To you and all mankind.
‘To you in David’s town this day
Is born of David’s line
A Saviour, who is Christ the Lord;
And this shall be the sign:
The heavenly Babe you there shall find
To human view displayed,
All meanly wrapped in swathing bands,
And in a manger laid.’
Thus spake the seraph; and forthwith
Appeared a shining throng
Of angels praising God, who thus
Addressed their joyful song:
‘All glory be to God on high,
And on the earth be peace;
Good-will henceforth from heaven to men
Begin and never cease.’
From Little Women
by Louisa May Alcott
Read by Capucine Blanc; Sung by Louise Neubronner
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THE JUNGFRAU TO BETH
God bless you, dear Queen Bess!
May nothing you dismay,
But health and peace and happiness
Be yours, this Christmas day.
Here’s fruit to feed our busy bee,
And flowers for her nose.
Here’s music for her pianee,
An afghan for her toes,
A portrait of Joanna, see,
By Raphael No. 2
Who laboured with great industry
To make it fair and true.
Accept a ribbon red, I beg,
For Madam Purrer’s tail,
And ice cream made by lovely Peg,
A Mont Blanc in a pail.
Their dearest love my makers laid
Within my breast of snow.
Accept it, and the Alpine maid,
From Laurie and from Jo.
From A Child’s Christmas in Wales
by Dylan Thomas
Read by Julia Schatz
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…One, two, three, and we began to sing, our voices high and seemingly distant in the snow-felted darkness round the house that was occupied by nobody we knew. We stood close together, near the dark door.
And then a small, dry voice, like the voice of someone who has not spoken for a long time, joined our singing: a small, dry, eggshell voice from the other side of the door: a small, dry voice through the keyhole. And when we stopped running we were outside our house; the front room was lovely; balloons floated under the hot-water-bottle-gulping gas; everything was good again and shone over the town…
From Vincent
by Tim Burton
Read by Gero Guttzeit
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…Her anger now spent, she walked out through the hall
And while Vincent backed slowly against the wall
The room started to swell, to shiver and creak
His horrid insanity had reached its peak
…
He saw Abercrombie, his zombie slave
And heard his wife call from beyond the grave
She spoke from her coffin and made ghoulish demands
While, through cracking walls, reached skeleton hands
…
Every horror in his life that had crept through his dreams
Swept his mad laughter to terrified screams!
To escape the madness, he reached for the door
But fell limp and lifeless down on the floor…
From the Cider with Rosie
by Laurie Lee
Read by Laurie Atkinson
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The week before Christmas, when the snow seemed to lie thickest, was the moment for carol-singing; and when I think back to those nights it is to the crunch of snow and to the lights of the lanterns on it. Carol-singing in my village was a special tithe for the boys, the girls had little to do with it. Like hay-making, blackberrying, stone-clearing and wishing-people-a- happy-Easter, it was one of our seasonal perks. By instinct we knew just when to begin it; a day too soon and we should have been unwelcome, a day too late and we should have received lean looks from people whose bounty was already exhausted. When the true moment came, exactly balanced, we recognised it and were ready…
Illustration by Mark Hearld, in Laurie Lee, Cider with Rosie (London: Vintage, 2014), p. 138
From A Good Man is Hard to Find
by Flannery O’Connor
Read by Curtis Runstedler
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Alone with The Misfit, the grandmother found that she had lost her voice. There was not a cloud in the sky nor any sun. There was nothing around her but woods. She wanted to tell him that he must pray. She opened and closed her mouth several times before anything came out. Finally she found herself saying, “Jesus. Jesus,“ meaning, Jesus will help you, but the way she was saying it, it sounded as if she might be cursing. “Yes’m,” The Misfit said as if he agreed. “Jesus shown everything off balance…
“In Memoriam [Ring out, wild Bells]“
by Alfred Lord Tennyson
Read by Amanda Vernon
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Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.
Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.
Ring out the grief that saps the mind
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.
Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.
Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes
But ring the fuller minstrel in.
Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.
Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.
Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.
FromThe Wind in The Willows
by Kenneth Grahame
Read by Robert McColl
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Villagers all, this frosty tide,
Let your doors swing open wide,
Though wind may follow, and snow beside,
Yet draw us in by your fire to bide;
Joy shall be yours in the morning!
Here we stand in the cold and the sleet,
Blowing fingers and stamping feet,
Come from far away you to greet–
You by the fire and we in the street–
Bidding you joy in the morning!
“It Came Upon The Midnight Clear“
by Edmund Sears (Text) and Arthur Sullivan (Melody)
Sung by The Seminar “Music and Poetry in Elizabethan and Jacobean England“
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IT came upon the midnight clear,
That glorious song of old,
From angels bending near the earth
To touch their harps of gold:
‘Peace on the earth, good-will to men,
From heaven’s all gracious King!‘
The world in solemn stillness lay
To hear the angels sing.
Still through the cloven skies they come,
With peaceful wings unfurled;
And still their heavenly music floats
O‘er all the weary world;
Above its sad and lowly plains
They bend on hovering wing;
And ever o‘er its Babel sounds
The blesséd angels sing.
Yet with the woes of sin and strife
The world has suffered long;
Beneath the angel-strain have rolled
Two thousand years of wrong;
And man, at war with man, hears not
The love-song which they bring:
O hush the noise, ye men of strife,
And hear the angels sing!
For lo! the days are hastening on,
By prophet bards foretold,
When, with the ever-circling years,
Comes round the age of gold;
When peace shall over all the earth
Its ancient splendours fling,
And the whole world give back the song
Which now the angels sing.
From A Christmas Carol
by Charles Dickens
Read by Léa Fourure
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Upon its coming in, the dying flame leaped up, as though it cried, “I know him; Marley’s Ghost!“ and fell again. The same face: the very same. Marley in his pigtail, usual waistcoat, tights and boots; the tassels on the latter bristling, like his pigtail, and his coat-skirts, and the hair upon his head. The chain he drew was clasped about his middle…
From Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
by Lewis Carroll
Read and sung by Vera Yakupova
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“Will you walk a little faster?“ said a whiting to a snail.
“There’s a porpoise close behind us, and he’s treading on my tail.
See how eagerly the lobsters and the turtles all advance!
They are waiting on the shingle—will you come and join the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, won’t you join the dance?
“You can really have no notion how delightful it will be
When they take us up and throw us, with the lobsters, out to sea!“
But the snail replied “Too far, too far!“ and gave a look askance—
Said he thanked the whiting kindly, but he would not join the dance.
Would not, could not, would not, could not, would not join the dance.
Would not, could not, would not, could not, could not join the dance.
“What matters it how far we go?“ his scaly friend replied.
“There is another shore, you know, upon the other side.
The further off from England the nearer is to France—
Then turn not pale, beloved snail, but come and join the dance.
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, won’t you join the dance?“
From Mr. Splitfoot
by Samantha Hunt
Read by Molly Bronstein
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Every record in the collection is old. No one has lived here for a while. No one buys records anymore. Whatever the reason, each album feels like a forgotten archive of the way life once was here on Earth. She chooses the Bee Gees, Spirits Having Flown. She likes the title…
“A Christmas Carol”
by Christina Rossetti
Read by Capucine Blanc
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“Please Come Home for Christmas“ (1960)
by Charles Brown
Performed by Frank Robbins (piano) and Sandra Robbins (singing)
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Please Come Home for Christmas
Bells will be ringin’ the sad, sad news
Oh, what a Christmas to have the blues
My baby’s gone, I have no friends
To wish me greetings once again
Choirs will be singin’ Silent Night
Christmas carols by candlelight
Please come home for Christmas, please come home for Christmas
If not for Christmas, by New Year’s night
Friends and relations send salutations
Sure as the stars shine above
But this is Christmas, yes, Christmas, my dear
Some time of year to be with the one you love
So won’t you tell me you’ll never more roam?
Christmas and New Year’s will find you home
There’ll be no more sorrow, no grief and pain
And I’ll be happy, happy once again
Ooh, there’ll be no more sorrow, no grief and pain
And I’ll be happy, Christmas once again
“Minstrels“
by William Wordsworth
Sung by Celine Beck
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The minstrels played their Christmas tune
To-night beneath my cottage-eaves;
While, smitten by a lofty moon,
The encircling laurels, thick with leaves,
Gave back a rich and dazzling sheen,
That overpowered their natural green.
Through hill and valley every breeze
Had sunk to rest with folded wings:
Keen was the air, but could not freeze,
Nor check, the music of the strings;
So stout and hardy were the band
That scraped the chords with strenuous hand.
And who but listened?–—till was paid
Respect to every inmate’s claim,
The greeting given, the music played
In honour of each household name,
Duly pronounced with lusty call,
And “Merry Christmas“ wished to all.
“L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato“
by George Frideric Händel, sung by the Choir of The King\’s Consort
A contribution from CRC Different Aesthetics A04
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L’Allegro (soprano or tenor)
Or let the merry bells ring round,
And the jocund rebecks sound
To many a youth, and many a maid,
Dancing in the checquer’d shade.
Chorus
And young and old come forth to play
On a sunshine holiday,
Till the livelong daylight fail.
Thus past the day, to bed they creep,
By whisp’ring winds soon lull’d asleep.
Today, on the 16th December 2024, Claudius Hille and Prof. Dr. Matthew Gardner will be giving a lecture as part of the CRC’s lecture series titled “Musik und Kultur in englischen Badeorten: Bath im 18. Jahrhundert”.
Day and Time: Winter Semester 2024/25, Mondays 6–8pm
Location: Kupferbau, HS 25
Event organiser: Prof. Dr. Jörg Robert
Recording on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nra6TYkDSfo
“Messiah (Christmas Portions)“
by Mark Doty
Read by Eva Marek
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A little heat caught
in gleaming rags,
in shrouds of veil,
torn and sun-shot swaddlings:
over the Methodist roof,
two clouds propose a Zion
of their own, blazing
(colors of tarnish on copper)
against the steely close
of a coastal afternoon, December,
while under the steeple
the Choral Society
prepares to perform
Messiah, pouring, in their best
blacks and whites, onto the raked stage.
Not steep, really,
but from here,
the first pew, they‘re a looming
cloudbank of familiar angels:
that neighbor who
fights operatically
with her girlfriend, for one,
and the friendly bearded clerk
from the post office
—tenor trapped
in the body of a baritone? Altos
from the A&P, soprano
from the T-shirt shop:
today they‘re all poise,
costume and purpose
conveying the right note
of distance and formality.
Silence in the hall,
anticipatory, as if we‘re all
about to open a gift we’re not sure
we‘ll like;
how could they
compete with sunset‘s burnished
oratorio? Thoughts which vanish,
when the violins begin.
Who‘d have thought
they‘d be so good? Every valley,
proclaims the solo tenor,
(a sleek blonde
I‘ve seen somewhere before
—the liquor store?) shall be exalted,
and in his handsome mouth the word
is lifted and opened
into more syllables
than we could count, central ah
dilated in a baroque melisma,
liquefied; the pour
of voice seems
to make the unplaned landscape
the text predicts the Lord
will heighten and tame.
This music
demonstrates what it claims:
glory shall be revealed. If art‘s
acceptable evidence,
mustn‘t what lies
behind the world be at least
as beautiful as the human voice?
The tenors lack confidence,
and the soloists,
half of them anyway, don‘t
have the strength to found
the mighty kingdoms
these passages propose
—but the chorus, all together,
equals my burning clouds,
and seems itself to burn,
commingled powers
deeded to a larger, centering claim.
These aren‘t anyone we know;
choiring dissolves
familiarity in an up-
pouring rush which will not
rest, will not, for a moment,
be still.
Aren‘t we enlarged
by the scale of what we‘re able
to desire? Everything,
the choir insists,
might flame;
inside these wrappings
burns another, brighter life,
quickened, now,
by song: hear how
it cascades, in overlapping,
lapidary waves of praise? Still time.
Still time to change.
“On the Thirteenth Day of Christmas My True Love Phoned Me Up“
by Dave Calder
Read by Nora Schalkers
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Well, I suppose I should be grateful, you’ve obviously gone
to a lot of trouble and expense – or maybe off your head.
Yes, I did like the birds – the small ones anyway were fun
if rather messy, but now the hens have roosted on my bed
and the rest are nested on the wardrobe. It’s hard to sleep
with all that cooing, let alone the cackling of the geese
whose eggs are everywhere, but mostly in a broken smelly heap
on the sofa. No, why should I mind? I can’t get any peace
anywhere – the lounge is full of drummers thumping tom-toms
and sprawling lords crashed out from manic leaping. The
kitchen is crammed with cows and milkmaids and smells of a million stink-bombs
and enough sour milk to last a year. The pipers? I’d forgotten them –
they were no trouble, I paid them and they went. But I can’t get rid
of these young ladies. They won’t stop dancing or turn the music down
and they’re always in the bathroom, squealing as they skid
across the flooded floor. No, I don’t need a plumber round,
it’s just the swans – where else can they swim? Poor things,
I think they’re going mad, like me. When I went to wash my
hands one ate the soap, another swallowed the gold rings.
And the pear tree died. Too dry. So thanks for nothing, love. Goodbye.
“‘Twas the Night Before Christmas“
by Werner Herzog
Read by Everett Messamore
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“Whatever the specifics, existential thirst is the engine that drives the holiday machine“
Werner Herzog\’s original recording, which this entry is a homage to, can be found here.
“The Daft-Days“
by Robert Fergusson
Read by Jonathan Sharp
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Now mirk December’s dowie face
Glowrs owr the rigs wi sour grimace,
While, thro’ his minimum of space,
The bleer-ey’d sun,
Wi blinkin light and stealing pace,
His race doth run.
From naked groves nae birdie sings,
To shepherd’s pipe nae hillock rings,
The breeze nae od’rous flavour brings
From Borean cave,
And dwyning nature droops her wings,
Wi visage grave.
Auld Reikie! thou’rt the canty hole,
A bield for many caldrife soul,
Wha snugly at thine ingle loll,
Baith warm and couth,
While round they gar the bicker roll
To weet their mouth.
When merry Yule-day comes, I trou,
You’ll scantlins find a hungry mou;
Sma are our cares, our stamacks fou
O’ gusty gear,
And kickshaws, strangers to our view,
Sin fairn-year.
Then, tho’ at odds wi a’ the warl’,
Amang oursels we’ll never quarrel;
Tho’ Discord gie a canker’d snarl
To spoil our glee,
As lang’s there’s pith into the barrel
We’ll drink and ‘gree.
Fidlers, your pins in temper fix,
And roset weel your fiddle-sticks;
But banish vile Italian tricks
Frae out your quorum,
Not fortes wi pianos mix –
Gie’s Tulloch Gorum.
For nought can cheer the heart sae weel
As can a canty Highland reel;
It even vivifies the heel
To skip and dance:
Lifeless is he wha canna feel
Its influence.
Let mirth abound, let social cheer
Invest the dawning of the year;
Let blithesome innocence appear
To crown our joy;
Nor envy wi sarcastic sneer
Our bliss destroy.
Five Haiku
by Richard Wright
Read by Michael Reid
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583
A long winter rain:
A whistling old man whittles
A dream on a stick.
723
In the afterglow
A snow-covered mountain peak
Sings of loneliness.
31
In the falling snow
A laughing boy holds out his palms
Until they are white.
336
Hidden by snowflakes,
A horse neighs excitedly
In a white silence.
681
“Come out of the cold!“
A lighted window beckons
Through falling snow.
“Music on Christmas Morning“
by Anne Brontë
Read by Patricia Klaß
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Music I love — but never strain
Could kindle raptures so divine,
So grief assuage, so conquer pain,
And rouse this pensive heart of mine —
As that we hear on Christmas morn,
Upon the wintry breezes borne.
Though Darkness still her empire keep,
And hours must pass, ere morning break;
From troubled dreams, or slumbers deep,
That music kindly bids us wake:
It calls us, with an angels voice,
To wake, and worship, and rejoice;
To greet with joy the glorious morn,
Which angels welcomed long ago,
When our redeeming LORD was born,
To bring the Light of Heaven below;
The Powers of Darkness to dispel,
And rescue Earth from Death and Hell.
While listening to that sacred strain,
My raptured spirit soars on high;
I seem to hear those songs again
Resounding through the open sky,
That kindled such divine delight,
In those who watched their flocks by night.
With them, I celebrate His birth —
Glory to God, in highest Heaven,
Good-will to men, and peace on Earth,
To us a Saviour-King is given;
Our God is come to claim His own,
And Satan\’s power is overthrown!
A sinless God, for sinful men,
Descends to suffer and to bleed;
Hell must renounce its empire then;
The price is paid, the world is freed,
And Satan’s self must now confess,
That Christ has earned a Right to bless:
Now holy Peace may smile from Heaven,
And heavnly Truth from earth shall spring:
The captives galling bonds are riven,
For our Redeemer is our king;
And He that gave His blood for men
Will lead us home to God again.
Little Drummer Boy
by Katherine K. Davis
Reading & Illustration: Susan Holliday
Pianist: Frank Robbins
Singer: Sandra Robbins
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Katherine K. Davis, born 1892 in the US state of Missouri, was a prolific composer, arranger, pianist and music teacher. At the young age of 15, Davis composed her first song Shadow March and continued writing over 600 compositions, many for the choirs at her school. Davis studied at Wellesley College in Boston and the New England Conservatory of Music. She continued at Wellesley teaching music theory and piano. She also studied with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. During her stay in France, Davis was inspired by the French song Patapan which she translated to “Pa-rum-pum-pum” and it took on a rhythm. In 1941, She wrote The Carol of the Drums, later titled The Little Drummer Boy.
“Church Music“
by George Herbert
Read by Matthias Bauer
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Sweetest of sweets, I thank you: when displeasure
Did through my bodie wound my minde,
You took me thence, and in your house of pleasure
A daintie lodging me assign’d.
Now I in you without a bodie move,
Rising and falling with your wings:
We both together sweetly live and love,
Yet say sometimes,God help poore Kings.
Comfort, I’le die; for if you poste from me,
Sure I shall do so, and much more:
But if I travell in your companie,
You know the way to heavens doore.
“The Rebel Jesus”
by Jackson Browne
Read by Christoph Reinfandt
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(Check out the sung versions by Jackson Browne himself and by Jackson Browne & the ChieDains)
All the streets are filled with laughter and light
And the music of the season
And the merchants’ windows are all bright
With the faces of the children
And the families hurrying to their homes
While the sky darkens and freezes
Will be gathering around the hearths and tables
Giving thanks for God\’s graces
And the birth of the rebel Jesus
Well they call him by ‘the Prince of Peace’
And they call him by ‘the Savior’
And they pray to him upon the seas
And in every bold endeavor
And they fill his churches with their pride and gold
While their faith in him increases
But they’ve turned the nature that I worship in
From a temple to a robber’s den
In the words of the rebel Jesus
Well we guard our world with locks and guns
And we guard our fine possessions
And once a year when Christmas comes
We give to our relations
And perhaps we give a little to the poor
If the generosity should seize us
But if any one of us should interfere
In the business of why there are poor
They get the same as the rebel Jesus
Now pardon me if I have seemed
To take the tone of judgement
For I\’ve no wish to come between
This day and your enjoyment
In a life of hardship and of earthly toil
There\’s a need for anything that frees us
So I bid you pleasure
And I bid you cheer
From a heathen and a pagan
On the side of the rebel Jesus
Words and music by Jackson Browne (1977 Swallow Turn Music ASCAP)
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