Sunday, November 25, 2018

Franz Xaver Gruber - Stille Nacht (Silent Night)

Image von der Wik
Now that we're past Thanksgiving, it's now officially Christmas season.  You've heard of today's artist, featured each holiday season.  No, not Hans Gruber, although he's also featured each holiday season.  Yippie kayay ...

No, today we're looking at Franz Gruber, church organist at the German village of Arnsdorf.  200 years ago he composed what may be the most famous Christmas carol of all times, famous in two languages.  The local priest showed him a poem that the priest had written, and Gruber scratched out a tune on a guitar because the organ was broken.  The rest, as they say, is history.

The 1818 Christmas Mass in Arnsdorf was the first time this song was sung.  It is said that the "Christmas Truce" in 1914 began with German and English soldiers singing this to each other across No Man's Land.

3 comments:

  1. libertymanNovember 25, 2018 at 11:08 AM

    A wonderful rendition. I ran off to amazon and bought her Christmas CD.
    Thank you for the introduction!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Glenn BNovember 25, 2018 at 7:16 PM

    After reading that brief history of Silent Night- I would think the priest deserves at least half of the credit for having created one of the most, if not the most, famous Christmas carol. Putting it to music, excellent music at that, is one thing but I think the words of that poem turned song are what made the accompanying music possible in the first place.

    ReplyDelete
  3. LSPNovember 25, 2018 at 11:03 PM

    Beautiful, note reredos.

    ReplyDelete

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