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Top Comments: Music for Christmas Eve, and an Open Thread [1]

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Date: 2023-12-24  

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Tonight’s music will be a collection of my personal favorites and other songs of special significance. I am personally drawn to folk music of America and the British Isles, and I’m drawn to more obscure stuff. If you came here looking for “All I Want for Christmas is You,” I’m sorry to disappoint you. Anyway, let’s get started.

Tonight I’m featuring two different settings of the same carol, first and next-to-last in the diary. We’ll start with the shape-note setting, “Star in the East,” which can be found in the Southern Harmony. This has become my favorite carol. It sounds medieval, but it’s American.

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Now for some some traditional English carols performed by Nowell Sing We Clear featuring the late Tony Barrand:

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The “Ten Joys of Mary” is one of those counting songs, like “The Twelve Days of Christmas.” Here’s another from the African-American tradition:

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Now for another shape note hymn, called Sherburne. Shape note hymn singing is a distinctly American tradition, but I’m posting a recording from the 2020 Ireland Sacred Harp Convention because their recordings are superlative, and the Irish sing so well. (This recording was made just before the pandemic brought all such gatherings to a halt.)

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I’ve mentioned before that my mother was French. Last night, zenbassoon featured her favorite carol “Il est né le divine enfant,” so I won’t post that. Instead, I’ll post my French grandfather’s favorite carol, “Minuit Chrétien.” You might recognize it as “O Holy Night.” As my maternal grandfather died long before I was born, it was my mother who told me this was his favorite Christmas song. Given his preference for opera, I think he would have liked this performance:

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Here, I’ll toss in a more recent favorite from songwriter Bob Franke, “Straw Against the Chill,” as performed by the Short Sisters:

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Jean Ritchie learned the carol “Brightest and Best” in the rural eastern Kentucky community where she grew up. It has the same words as “Star in the East,” but a different melody:

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I’ll leave you with a Twelfth Night song (Twelfth Night = Epiphany = Three Kings Day). Of course, Twelfth Night doesn’t come for another 12 days, and by that time, most normal people have completely forgotten about Christmas. So I’ll post this now for the normal people:

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Have a Merry Christmas, all. For those who listened to the songs here, I’m glad you chose to pass the time with me. Let’s hope for a better year come January 1.

Comments are below the fold.

Top Comments (December 24, 2023):

From Crashing Vor:

Doc Savage's response to Lib Dem FoP's hypothesis as to why British children can booze it up at 5 years old is your holiday Top Comment. Posted in Adventurist’s diary Boozy-woozy England.

From Northern Pol:

A perfect remark by URBeautiful regarding the recent revelations that Trump stinks up the storm troopers. From EphemeralNotion’s recommended diary on the topic of Trump’s distinctive, um, aroma.

Highlighted by Nanny Ogg:

This comment by theghostofjohndewey in tonight’s Evening Shade post by hpg.

Top Mojo (December 23, 2023):

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