Christmas carols by Bookworm

Dec 19, 2003

A carol is a popular hymn of joyful nature, in celebration of an occasion

A carol is a popular hymn of joyful nature, in celebration of an occasion. The carol is characterised by simplicity of thought and expression.
Christmas carol is a song whose lyrics are on the theme of Christmas, or the winter season in general. They are traditionally sung in the period before Christmas.

They are intended for singing in church, or as part of religious services including Carol services.
Some such songs have words which are clearly not on a religious theme, but are often still referred to as carols Songs such as White Christmas or even Blue Christmas are clearly not Christmas carols, though popular in the period before Christmas, and should therefore be considered to be Christmas songs.

The earliest English carols date to the 15th century. Since the many churches have special services at which some of the more religious carols are sung, and often these are combined with readings about the birth of Christ. Some of these services also include other music written for Christmas.

The Apostles sang songs of praise, many based on the Psalms. One of the earliest known Christmas songs is from the 4th Century, Jesus refulsit omnium, composed by St. Hilary of Poitiers, according to Rev. Samuel Lwere. The best known Christmas carol is Silent Night, written in 1818 by an Austrian assistant priest Joseph Mohr. He was told the day before Christmas that the church organ was broken and would not be repaired in time for Christmas Day.

Saddened, he sat down to write three stanzas that could be sung by choir to guitar music. Today, Silent Night, Holy Night is sung in more than 180 languages by millions of people.
The biggest selling Christmas single of all time is Bing Crosby’s White Christmas.

Every Christmas season, record
companies rush to release Christian and secular Christmas songs by artists young and old.
The late Philly Lutaaya composed some local carols on his albums Tumusiinze. There are many other carols in our local languages.

(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});