Carol, ‘The First Noel’

I wouldn’t want it said I passed over this carol.

As a bonus, there are chord diagrams on the screen so you can play along with your own guitar. It’s been a long, long time since I did that. Those basic chords are old friends.

The First Noel, as sung by Chris Tomlin–enjoy it.

 

Carol, ‘It Came Upon a Midnight Clear’

No one has yet requested this, but I love this carol, so here it is.

We still have four days: plenty of time for The First Noel, Hark the Herald Angels Sing, and whatever else you might want to hear.

Let’s load up on Christmas spirit! We’ll need it again and again throughout the coming year.

‘We Three Kings’ (Male Singers)

This is the Welsh Male Voice Choir of South Africa–just to let you see that us guys can sing, too. Well, we certainly can if we’re Welsh.

I’m still taking requests, folks, so I hope you haven’t run out of them already.

Hymn, ‘The Wexford Carol’

My editor, Susan, suggested this one. I’d never heard of it.

But wow! This is gorgeous. The combination of an angelic singing voice (Alison Krauss), cello (Yo-Yo Ma), and bagpipes?–yes, bagpipes–is as beautiful as it is unexpected.

Carol, ‘What Child is This?’

Contrary to legend, Henry VIII had nothing to do with composing this melody, which was first published in England as “Greensleeves” in 1580. Since then, Christmas lyrics have been written to celebrate the birth of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God

This one is a very nice instrumental version.

Hymn, ‘Angels We Have Heard on High’

I couldn’t wait till tomorrow to post this. It’s an old French hymn, and I love it. Angels We Have Heard on High–right out of the Gospel of Luke. I hope you enjoy it, as I do.

P.S.–I fully expected someone to win the Comment Contest today, but things kind of ground to a halt this afternoon. If you post the 4,000th comment here, you win one of my books.

Carol, ‘We Three Kings’

I think I’ve caught up on reader requests with this one, We Three Kings by Mediaeval Baebes. Somewhere along the way I’d like to find a version sung by men with deep voices, but this one’s nice.

This is one we always used to sing in Sunday school. Hey, remember when we sang Christmas carols in public school?

Those were better days than these.

Carol, ‘O, Tannenbaum’ (Nat King Cole)

This carol, sung in German, was a Christmas fixture at my grandpa’s house, and my mother used to sing it to us, too. It’s here at my wife’s request.

How I miss those Christmases at grandpa’s house! It was amazing, how many people could fit into it for a family Christmas.

But, as Our Lord Jesus told us, “In my father’s house are many mansions…”

We will have a place to stay when we get there. Amen.

Carol, ‘Mary’s Boy Child’ by Boney M

By request, a Christmas carol with a Caribbean accent.

I never heard of Boney M, but I have discovered the group was named for one of our all-time favorite fictional characters, Detective Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte of the Queensland C.I.D., “Bony” to his friends. “Boney” with an “e” is an error perpetrated by a New Zealand TV series featuring D.I. Bonaparte.

But we are drifting away from Christmas, and it’s time for a course correction.

‘Away in a Manger’ (American Melody)

This is the usual melody when Americans sing Away in a Manger. If you’re tuning in from the UK or thereabouts, you might not have heard it before.

And now I’ve got to stop blogging and get some work done. There’s piles and piles of it around here. *sigh*