Most history books will tell you that the last “battle” of the American Indian Wars was at Wounded Knee on December 28, 1890 when troopers of the 7th Cavalry opened fire on captured“renegade” Lakota.  It was more of a massacre than a battle in which more than 150 men, women, and children were killed in the snow and some troopers died in their own cross fire.  It was certainly the bloodiest of late Indian war battles.  But not the last.  The Drexel Mission Fight occurred a day later between fleeing Lakota and elements of the 7th and 9th Cavalry.

Those may have been the biggest engagements, but over nearly the next 30 years there were skirmishes between the Army and small groups of Native Americans across the West.  The final battle was fought on January 9, 1918 at Bear Valley near the Arizona border with Mexico. 

The episode was actually a spillover from a long war within a war by the Yaqui people of Sonora for an independent homeland in Mexico.  That war had essentially been going on for decades and had been enveloped by the larger Mexican Revolution.  Many Yaquis routinely crossed the porous border into the United States to work on the cotton farms of southern Arizona where they were prized workers noted for their diligence and endurance under brutal heat.  The Yaqui would pool the money they earned and buy firearms—mostly Winchester 30.30s or imported German Mausers—and ammunition to take back into Mexico to continue the fight.

Late in 1917 the military governor of Sonora, General Plutarco Elías Calles, informally requested help from the United States government to quash the cross border arms trade.  At the same time local ranchers were complaining that Yaqui bands were trespassing on their lands and sometimes slaughtering stray cattlefor food, or simply for their hidesto make quick, crude sandals for crossing the rugged desert terrain.

Most of the US Army, of course, was in or on its way to France.  But not the Buffalo Soldiers of the 10th Cavalry.  After seeing how British cavalry had been cut to ribbons by machine gun fire early in the Great War, the Army had decided not to deploycavalry in the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF).  Despite the fact that the AEF was commanded by a former Buffalo Soldier Cavalry officer, General John J. “Blackjack” Pershing, the tough and storied American Cavalry was stuck in remote western posts guarding against a vanishing threat of Indian uprising.  It was a bitter pill for both the white officers and Black troopers.

None the less, when The Nogales, Arizona subdistrict commander, Colonel J.C. Friersof the 35th Infantry ordered his men and the 10th to take up a string of positions along the border to try and interdictthe arms smugglers, the cavalrymen dutifully followed orders.  At the far end of the line of bivouacs was a position at Atascosa Canyon, a natural border crossing within Bear Valley.  It was wildand remote country, considered a no-man’s land where local ranchers and their families took precautions when traversing.  Frequent reports of slaughtered cattle in the area indicated relatively heavy usage by the Yaqui.

Early in January 1918 Captain Frederick H.L. “Blondy” Ryderand 30 men of Troop E took up the Bear Valley position.  They camped by an abandoned rancho on a high ridge.  A rock formation provided a sweeping panorama of the surrounding, flat desert land.  Ryder posted signalmen with high powered binocularson the summit to keep watch.

On January 8 a local cattleman rode into camp and reported that a neighbor had found a fresh beef kill, only parts of its hide stripped for sandals.  The Yaqui were in the immediate area and on the move.  First Lieutenant William Scott and a detail reinforcedthe observation post.  About mid-day on the 9th Scott used hand signals to show that the Indians were in sight and moving less than a quarter of a mile away.  By the time troopers in camp saddled up they had vanished but Scott used hand signals to show the direction of their movements.

When the Troopers thought they were near their objective they dismounted and advanced in a skirmish line through a rugged draw.  Capt. Ryder decided that they had lost contact and decided to return to the horses, returning to them down a different route.  He soon stumbled on a bunch of abandoned packs.  He knew he must be right on top of the Yaqui.  He reformed his skirmish line the troops advanced again.  They soon came under rifle fire. 

Colonel Harold B. Wharfield, a historian of the 10th Cavalry, wrote after interviewing both Army and Yaquis participants in the fight:

…the fighting developed into an old kind of Indian engagement with both sides using all the natural cover of boulders and brush to full advantage. The Yaquis kept falling back, dodging from boulder to boulder and firing rapidly. They offered only a fleeting target, seemingly just a disappearing shadow. The officer saw one of them running for another cover, then stumble and thereby expose himself. A corporal alongside of the captain had a good chance for an open shot. At the report of the Springfield, a flash of fire enveloped the Indian's body for an instant, but he kept on to the rock.

The troops slowly advanced and firing was hot and heavy for about half an hour, although casualties were very light because both sides were fighting under good cover.  Finally the troopers overwhelmed a small rear guard covering the retreat of the rest of the band successfully into Mexico.

There were 10 captives.  Ryder later wrote:

… It was a courageous stand by a brave group of Indians; and the Cavalrymen treated them with the respect due to fighting men. Especially astonishing was the discovery that one of the Yaquis was an eleven-year old boy. The youngster had fought bravely alongside his elders, firing a rifle that was almost as long as he was tall. ...Though time has perhaps dimmed some details, the fact that this was my first experience under fire—and it was a hot one even though they were poor marksmen—most of the action was indelibly imprinted on my mind. After the Yaquis were captured we lined them up with their hands above their heads and searched them. One kept his hands around his middle. Fearing that he might have a knife to use on some trooper, I grabbed his hands and yanked them up. His stomach practically fell out. This was the man who had been hit by my corporal's shot. He was wearing two belts of ammunition around his waist and more over each shoulder. The bullet had hit one of the cartridges in his belt, causing it to be exploded, making the flash of fire I saw. Then the bullet entered one side and came out the other, laying his stomach open. He was the chief of the group.

Ryder’s men treated the chief’s wounds as well as they were able.  The Captain sent a messenger to try to obtain an automobileto use as an ambulance to transport the gravely wounded man to a hospital.  When none was found the Chief and others were mounted on spare horses for the return to base at Nogales.  The Chief stoically endured the agonizing 20 mile trip and even the uninjured captives suffered because not being as Ryder said “horse Indians” they could barely stay on and suffered bloody chaffing on bare legs or through thin cotton trousers.

Under questioning the Yaqui told their captors that they had only fired on them because they thought they were Mexican and that they would have surrendered immediately if they had known that their pursuers were American.

The Yaqui captives were held for weeks at Nogales while the Army tried to decide what the hell to do with them.  They adapted well.  In fact with three meals a day of the same rationsas the troopers, warm tents and blankets they were probably more comfortable than any had been for years.  They adapted well to camp life and were soon doing clean up dutyand other chores around the base with little or no supervision.  They were exceptionally clean and orderly and one observer marveled. 

At the corral nearly any droppings were allowed to hit the ground. During the day the Indians would stand around watching the horses. Whenever a tail was lifted, out they rushed with their scoop shovels and caught it before the manure could contaminate the ground. It certainly helped in the decline of the fly population.

The troopers and the Indians reportedly became very friendly and admired each other.  All of the survivors—the Chief had died from his wounds—including the 11 year old volunteeredto enlist in the Army.

But it was not to be so.  Orders came down from Washington and the Yaqui were transported in chains to Tucson for trial in Federal Court where they were charged with “wrongfully, unlawfully, and feloniously exporting to Mexico certain arms and ammunition, to wit: 300 rifle cartridges and about 9 rifles without first procuring an export license issued by the War Trade Board of the United States,” the Yaquis plead guilty and the men were sentenced by Judge William Henry Sawtelle to only thirty days in jail.  Charges against the boy were dismissed.

The Yaquis were happy with the outcome.  They were afraid they would be deported to Mexico where they would surely have been executed.  Upon release, they vanished from history.  Some undoubtedly melted back across the border.  Perhaps they even renewed their cross border activities.  Others may have stayed in the growing community of Yaqui exiles in Southern Arizona.

If this were a last hurrah for the Cavalry, it was not for the Yaqui.  Their fight in Sonora continued until 1928 when the Mexican Army finally crushed the last holdouts in an offensive that employed heavy artillery, machine guns, armored cars, and aircraft.

The Christmas season officially ends today as the Catholic Church and WesternChristian denominations that borrow its liturgical calendar observe the Feast of the Epiphany. In the United States and some other countries the feast is now celebrated on the First Sunday after New Year’s Day which would have been January 3 this year.  Theologicallyit is a celebration of the revelation to the world of Jesus as the fully human God the Son.  As such it celebrates a facet of the Trinity.  Little wonder that my Unitarian Universalists, who deny the whole Three-in-one God deal, don’t make much of the day.

There are several components of the revelation.  The first is the visit by the Magi to the Child in Bethlehem—the announcement of the Holy presence to the Gentile world.  Second is the baptism of Jesus in the River Jordan by his cousin John, the half-mad preacher.  Third is the marriage party in Canawhere Jesus was said to have performed his first miracles—proof of his divine power.

Despite the complexity of the multiple stories, in the West the Feast of the Epiphany is largely all about those Magi.  In a fact in most Latin American countries it is most commonly known as the Feast of the Three Kings, which sort of diverts attention from the alleged star.  On the Eve the Magi are finally added to Nativity scenesand on January 6, children wake up to gifts from the Kings.  It was the main gift giving occasion of the Christmas season, or at least was until ubiquitous Santa Claus began invading traditional cultures.

In Jolly Olde England the 5th was Twelfth Night of Shakespearean fame. It was a traditional time for mummingand the wassail. The Yule Log was left burning until the 6th.   It was also a day for playing practical jokes, similar to April Fool’s Day.   Thus all of the foolery in the Bard’s play which was written to be performed on its namesake.  All of this gayety and mirth, was, of course, squelched by those pesky Puritans and few vestigesof these traditions are still celebrated.

Now about those alleged Kings…First, it they existed at all they were surely not rulers of any sort.  What we know of them comes from the Gospel of Mathew as described in the King James Version:

2 Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem,

2 Saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him.

3 When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.

4 And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he demanded of them where Christ should be born.

5 And they said unto him, In Bethlehem of Judaea: for thus it is written by the prophet,

6 And thou Bethlehem, in the land of Juda, art not the least among the princes of Juda: for out of thee shall come a Governor, that shall rule my people Israel.

7 Then Herod, when he had privily called the wise men, enquired of them diligently what time the star appeared.

8 And he sent them to Bethlehem, and said, Go and search diligently for the young child; and when ye have found him, bring me word again, that I may come and worship him also.

9 When they had heard the king, they departed; and, lo, the star, which they saw in the east, went before them, till it came and stood over where the young child was.

10 When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy.

11 And when they were come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and worshipped him: and when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts; gold, and frankincense and myrrh.

12 And being warned of God in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed into their own country another way.

Note that they are not identified in any way as kings.  They are said to be from the east so it is likely that they were meant to represent Persian priests or Asian astrologers.  Nor is any number set.  The early church sometimes used figures up to twelve.  Eventually the number was settled at three and totally un-Biblical tales sprang up around them.  They even grew names and origin stories—Melchior, a Persian; Caspar, an Indian; and Balthazar from Arabia—perhaps from Yemen which then had Jewish kings. 

There is no reason to believe that their visit fit neatly into the later liturgical calendar twelve days after a mid-winter birth.  In fact the kind of Biblical scholars who try to find historical accuracy in the Biblethink that the visit may have been up to two years after the birth and that the Holy family may have been in residence in Bethlehem for that long.  They infer this from the fact that Herod ordered the massacre of all male children under two years of age, not just infants.

Then there is the issue of the Star.  Of course if you are a literalist, you believe that an actual star either hovered over the City of David, or actually moved, leading the Magi on their journey.  But those seeking natural explanations for the phenomena have proposed various possibilities, most commonly a comet or the appearance of a near-solar systemsuper nova.  The problem with either of these suggestions is that the very careful records kept by Chinese astrologers make no note of either phenomenon in a five year window around the time of Jesus’s presumed birth.  And they surely would have noted it.

One explanation that has gained some traction is that the Star was actually a triple conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in the constellation Pisces which is known to have occurred in 7 BCE, a little late for the story but close enough for some.  But contemporary Babylonian records show little interest in the event and does not suggest that the planets converged closely enough in the sky to create a super bright object.

Then perhaps it was a UFO.  That will probably be a History Channel two hour special next year.

Or the Star and the Magi are all pious fiction and poetry meant to inform the understanding of the birth of the Messiah to the Gentile world.  No mention of the Magi can be found in the simple nativity story found in Luke.  Presumably the sudden presence of well-dressed strangers in the stable would have been noted by those shepherds.  And why did they have to follow a Star when God apparently had no shortage of herald angels to tell the travelers just where to go.

But I don’t want to nit-pick a treasured story.  After all, much fiction can be truth in a broader sense, or at least symbolic of a truth.

Back to the Feast of the Epiphany.  The Copts and Eastern Orthodox also celebrate the feast but on different dates dependent on their calendars.  They also celebrate the incarnation of God in Man, but build their observances not so much on the Kings.  They concentrate on the Baptism as the great announcement.

It was also much more celebrated in the Medieval Western church as evidenced by many pre-Renaissance paintings of the Baptism and concerning Jesus’s relations with his cousin John.

But those virtually disappeared signaling a change of Christology in the Catholic Church.  Emphasis on John and other earthy relatives of Jesus such as his siblings like James of Jerusalem seemed uncomfortably close to viewing Jesus as a wholly mortal man, not a partner in a godhead.

Anyway, there you have it—The Feast of the Epiphany.  Celebrate or not as you choose.  But tomorrow it won’t be Christmas any more.

The song most associated with the Epiphany is, of Course, We Three Kings of Orient Are.  It   was written in 1857 by John Henry Hopkins Jr., Rector of Christ Episcopal Church in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. He wrote the carol for a Christmas pageant in New York City at his alma mater, the General Theological Seminary.  He published the carol in 1863 in his book Carols, Hymns, and Songs. It was the first American Christmas carol to achieve international popularity, as well as the first to be featured in Christmas Carols Old and New, the prestigious and influential collection published in Britain in 1916 and was printed in the hymnal of the Episcopal Church. 

It has been recorded countless times.  Among the loveliest of versions is by Blackmore’s Night the British/American traditional folk rock bandformed in 1997 by multi-instrumentalist Ritchie Blackmore and vocalist and woodwinds player Candice Night with a rotating ensemble of from 3 to 12 five additional musicians on Medieval and modern instruments and singing harmonies.  This trackwas featured on their 2006 album Winter Carols.

While most pop Christmas music may not still be appropriate, winter music that ends up on holiday play lists certainly is.  By far the most popular orchestral piecein that category is Sleigh Ride, a popular light orchestra standard composed by Leroy Anderson who had the original idea for the piece during a heat wave in July 1946 and finished the work in February 1948.  It was first recorded by in 1949 by Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops Orchestra and became the highlight of its annual Christmas concerts.

Anderson was born in 1908 in Cambridge, Massachusetts to immigrant Swedish parents.  In the late 1930’s he developed a relationship with Fiedler and there after provided the Pops with a steady stream of original compositions. John Williams described him as “one of the great American masters of light orchestral music.”  Among Anderson other signature pieces were Jazz Pizzicato/ Jazz Legato, Blue Tango, The Syncopated Clock, and Plink, Plank, Plunk! Which was used as the theme for the CBS panel showI’ve Got a Secret.  Starting in 1950 Anderson led his own studio orchestrafor recordings while the Pops and other light orchestras premiered live performances.

In 1950 lyricist Mitchell Parish wrote words which were first recorded by the Andrews Sisters.  Since then many artists have covered the vocal version.  Johnny Mathis sang the most popular on his 1958 Christmas album.  Parish’s original lyrics referred to a sleigh race to a “birthday party” but some performers including The Carpenters and Air Supply have altered that line to “Christmas party.”  The Ronettes with producer’s Phil Specter’s wall of sound arrangement made a version on their 1963 album which has gone on to regular seasonal air play as well.

Parish went on to write lyrics for several of Anderson’s other orchestral creations.

The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) consistently ranks it as one of the top 10 most-performed seasonal songs written by ASCAP members and named Sleigh Ride the most popularpiece of Christmas music in the U.S. in 2009–2012 including orchestral and vocal recordings, based on performance data from over 2,500 radio stations.

Anderson himself with his own Pops Concert Orchestra recorded Sleigh Ride on Decca Records in 1950 which became reached Cashbox magazine’s bestsellers chart when re-released in 1952.  Anderson’s version remains the most popular instrumental version based on holiday radio air play.

But today we are featuring the conductor and orchestra who introduced and first recorded Sleigh Ride—Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops.  Together they made three recording of the piece in 1949, 1959 and 1970.  Fiedler’s successors John Williams and Keith Lockhart have also made multiple recordings with the Pops.  No matter the conductor the piece is a signature highlight of the Pop’s annual Christmas concert which broadcast every year on PBS stations.  It is as much a tradition with the Pops as their annual Fourth of July concert’s 1812 Overture timed to sync with Boston’s fireworks.

Today is the last Sunday of the liturgical Christmas Season and so an apt time to dip into a really ancient Christian carol which covers the whole arc of the Nativity story from the arrival of Mary and Joseph in Bethlehem through the visit of the Magi.  The Wexford Carol is a traditional Irish carol from Enniscorthy in County Wexford.

The Wexford Carol, sometimes known by the name of the town of Enniscorthy or by its first line “Good people all this Christmas time.”  It is sometimes ascribed to the be from the early Middle Ages, but musicologists and folklorists now believe that it likely was composed in the 15th or 16th Century based on its musical and lyrical style.

The oldest recorded lyrics were in Gaelic. William Grattan Flood, the organist and musical director at St. Aidan's Cathedral in Enniscorthy, transcribedthe carol from a local singer and it was published in The Oxford Book of Carols in 1928.  From that it was included in many of the carol books printed around the world as well as some denominational hymnals.

Yet it remained a rather obscure song seldom performed, perhaps because it was originally circulated with the admonition that only male voice could perform it.  It began to have new found popularity when female singers including Julie Andrews in 1966 and Loreena McKennitt in 1987 defied tradition and recorded solo versions.  Notable choral versions include those by the English boy choir Libera in 2013 and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir three years later.

The Wexford Carol has lately become more popular in Irish and Celtic music circles. The Celtic Womenincluded it on their 2006 Christmas album and it was title track on the 2014 collection of traditional Irish Carols by the Irish early-music singer Caitríona O’Leary, with Tom Jones,   Rosanne Cash, and Rhiannon Giddens. Irish folksinger Cara Dillon featured the song on her 2016 album Upon a Winter’s Night.

Today’s rendition is a collaboration by country and roots music star Alison Krauss and cellist  Yo Yo Ma recorded for Ma’s 2008 holiday album, Songs of Joy and Peace.  Krauss forgoes her fiddle to sing ethereally.  The arrangement includes traditional Irish instruments including bag pipe, bodhrán drum, and finger chimes.

Post New Year’s Day is a good time to share one of those holiday playlist songs that really have nothing to do with Christmas or any other seasonal fest.  Among the most common of these are the winter or snow songs—think Frosty the Snowman for kids, the seduction or date rape song (take your pick) Baby its Cold Outside, Snow from the movie White Christmas, My Favorite Things from the Sound of Music, and of course Jingle Bells.  But the most popular of the more modern of those songs is Winter Wonderland.

The song was written in 1934 by Felix Bernard and lyricist Richard B. Smith. Since its original RCA recording by Richard Himber and his Hotel Ritz-Carlton Orchestra, it has been covered by over 200 different artists, including Bing Crosby, Dean Martin, Johnny Mathis, Frank Sinatra, Amy Grant, Michael Buble, The Eurythmics, and Radiohead.

Smith’s lyrics were reportedly inspired by memories of his hometown Honesdale, Pennsylvania park freshly buried in snow but were written while he was being treated for tuberculosis in the West Mountain Sanitarium in Scranton.

Children played in Central Park in Honesdale, Pa., across the street from Richard Smith’s childhood home, which inspired him to write Winter Wonderland.

Among the most notable covers were by Johnny Mercer which reached #4 on the Billboard radio play chart in 1946 and by Perry Como the same year which was in the top ten songs in retail sales.

Sinatra’s version is notable for changing the lyrics.  Despite the earlier success of the song, Sinatra was warned that powerful protestant clergy were prepared to demand that radio stationsban the song because of the line “In the meadow we will build a snowman/We’ll pretend that he is Parson Brown/He’ll say ‘are you married?’ We’ll say no man/But you can do the job when you’re in town.”  The preachers were alarmed that the words implied hanky-panky by the unmarried couple.  Old Blue Eyes changed the word to the nonsensical “In the meadow we can build a snowman /And pretend that he’s a circus clown/We’ll have lots of fun with Mr. Snowman/Until the other kiddies knock him down.”

Some other later covers of the song used Sinatra’s version while other stood by the original words.  Some even used both versions.

Today we will share a version by former big band singer turned movie star Doris Day.  The video clips accompanying her singing are from two popular nostalgia fests she made opposite Gordon McCrea, On Moonlight Bay  in 1951 and By The Light Of The Silvery Moon  in 1953. 

As we noted yesterday, no one celebratesNew Year’s more intently than the the Scotts except perhaps the Russians and residents of several other former states of the USSR but for quite different reasons.  Christmas, celebrated by the Russian Orthodox church on January 7 by the Western Gregorian calendar and all other religious observations were banned by the Communist government following the Russian Revolution.  Eventually under Josef Stalin all “non-patriotic” holidays or those glorifying Lenin and revolutionary events were also scrubbed, including a well-established New Year’s tradition.  In 1935 after the failure of the most recent Five Year Plan, regional crop failuresand famines, and the spreading influence of the world-wide Depression New Year’s was grudgingly acknowledge by Soviet to give Soviet citizens a glimmer of brightness as the bitter Russian winter closed in.

Russia had a long New Year’s tradition.  From 1492 until a December 1699 decree of Tsar Peter I mandated the adoption of the Christian Era in 1700 September 1 was the start of each new year.  Like many agricultural peoples the Russians considered the celebration of the harvest as an auspicious beginning.  According to the decree of Western and modernizing Peter the Great, the Russians had to decorate their houses with a fir tree, as it was done by the Germans between New Year’s on January 1 and Christmas on the Julian Calendar. But Slavs correlated the fir tree with funeral rites which is why there was long resistance to the new customs, especially among the deeply culturally conservative class of serfs—the vast majority of the population.  The peasantry held many different customs according to regions, but were generally allowed a holiday from their service to their feudal lords during the holiday period.

As for the nobility, aristocracy, and a small but growing class of wealthy merchants, they celebrated with glittering balls—think of pre-Napoleonic invasion scenes from War and Peace.  All of that, of course, came to a screeching halt with the Bolshevik Revolution and subsequent Civil War.  In 1918 the Supreme Soviet officially abandonedthe Julian Calendar of the Tsars and Orthodox church synchronizing New Years with European calendars.

After the grim years of World War II—the Great Patriotic War to the Soviets, it became a holiday in 1947.  At first there was no paid day off, but that soon fell in line with other holidays.  In the post-Soviet era the Russian Federationfollowed by most non-Muslim former Soviet republics declared Novy God—New Year’s Eve and Day—a major public holiday in 1999.  Under Vladimir Putin Russia has reconciled with the Orthodox Church and relied on it as a pillar of his Russian nationalism and vision of a restored Russian Empire or Soviet Union.  He has recognized Orthodox Christmas, still celebrated on the Julian Calendar date, and the whole week between New Year’s Day and the Feast of the Nativity is taken by many as an extended winter holiday.

Given an inch Soviet citizens ran with the opportunity and took a mile.  Plucked from some folk tales and children’s books the Santa Claus-like figure of Ded Moroz—Grandfather Frost—was  soon bring toys to children on New Year’s morning or distributing them a houses of culture, theaters, or other public buildings with the aid of his granddaughter Snegurochka—the Snow Maiden.  Some of Ded Moroz’s costume and characteristics borrow not only from Western Saint Nicholas, but from pagan Siberian shaman figuresassociated with the Winter Solstice.

Ded Moroz wears a heel-length fur coat, a fur hat, and valenki—warm felt boots—and has a long white beard. He walks with a long magic stick and often rides a troika sleigh.  Snegurochka wears long silver-blue robes and a furry cap or a snowflake-like crown.

New Year’s Eve the beginning of the celebration is marked by the Kremlin Clock striking midnight preceded by the New Year Address by the President of Russia—Putin—and followed by the playing of the Russian National Anthem.  Fireworks displays over Red Square and in most large cities attract large crowds. Of course this year most public gatherings are discouraged or banned due to the Coronavirus pandemic.

On New Year’s Day evening a popular TV spectacular, Novogodni Ogonek—New Year’s Party or New Year’s Light) includes performances from favorite pop singers and dance troupes with famous personalities and celebrities as presenters and is widely viewed in most of the countries of the former USSR.

Today we are featuring a New Year’s song from a hugely popular Russian musical comedy film—yes there really are such things—Karnavalnaya noch (Carnival Nights) made in 1955 in the post-Stalinist era and the Khrushchev Thaw.  It was the Soviet box office leader of 1956 with a total of 48.64 million tickets sold and remains a highly popular New Year’s Eve classic perennial broadcast publicly that night much like It’s a Wonderful Life or Christmas Story are annually shown on American TV.

The plot revolves around a Novy God program being planned by members of a House of Culture lots of dancing and singing, jazz bandperformance, and even magic tricks. The director of the House of Culture is suddenly replaced by a plodding Stalinist party functionary who tries to scrap the gay plans and replace them with a serious and grim evening of uplifting lectures, political discussions, and some classical music performed by an orchestra of limited talent made up Red Army pensioners.  The planners and performers of the original event scheme to sabotage the new director’s plans and keep him from the stage so that the original show can go on.  Small wonder that the story resonated with many Russians.

The nominal star of the film was comedian Igor Ilyinsky the hapless party functionary.  But 21-year-old Lyudmila Gurchenko in her first film role shined as the program’s lovely singer and a main organizer of the plot.  In this clip she sings a New Year’s song the title of which I cannot find in English.  Enjoy anyway.

Note—We will have another two-fer on New Year’s Eve.

Back in the day everyone who was not a misanthropeor a shut-in went out on New Year’s Eve.  The toffswore their white ties and tails and elegant evening gowns and furs to don paper hats and dance the night way to orchestras in sprawling Art Deco ballrooms.  At least that is what all of the old movies taught the rest of the Depression and war weary populous.  But those average Joes and Jills also went out and celebrated with their own funny hats and noise makers in urban ballrooms, lodge halls, piano bars, and neighborhood saloons.  And it was not just attractive young people.  Period photographs reveal that revelers include many middle age and older couples.

Drunk driving enforcement and cozy stay-at-home TV extravaganzas have been eating away at New Year’s Eve revelry for years.  And of course this year the Coronavirus precautions will leave the crystal ball to drop in an empty Times Square and in most places clubs and nightspots are shuttered or open to extremely limited capacity.  Dancing and smooching at midnight which cannot conform to social distancing or mask-wearingwill be discouraged in all but the kamikaze you-can’t-tell-me-what-to-do-libtard states.

But way back when for those who were not married or already romantically involved the question what are you doing New Year’s Eve was of vital importance.  Nobody wanted to be alone on New Year’s and everyone wanted someone to kiss at the stroke of midnight.  That is what songwriter Frank Loesser had in mind in 1947 when he made the question into a song—What are You Doing New Year’s Eve.  Although it was performed on radio shows that often featured the popular composer’s work, it didn’t become a hit until 1949 when the early doo-wopgroup The Orioles hit #9 on Billboard’sRhythm & Blues chart.

Despite that success, the song did not become an instant standard or holiday favorite.  In fact it languished seldom recorded until Nancy Wilson hit #17 on Billboard’s Christmas Singles chart in 1965.  Two years later the same recording returned to the Holiday Chart.  Wilson’s silky and sexy, take helped make the song a something of a jazz standard sung by the likes of Ella Fitzgerald and Nat King Cole.

But the song still didn’t register as a pop standard until the new century and streaming video from YouTube made it go viral.  In 2011 an utterly charming impromptu duet with Zooey Deschanel and actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt made a splash ultimately attracting more than 20 million hits.   And in 2017 Scott Bradlee’s Post Modern Juke Box covered the song featuring vocalists Rayvon Owen and Olivia Kuper Harris and has registered more than a million views.   

But the song still didn’t register as a pop standard until the new century and streaming video from YouTube made it go viral.  In 2011 an utterly charming impromptu duet with Zooey Deschanel and actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt made a splash ultimately attracting more than 20 million hits.   And in 2017 Scott Bradlee’s Post Modern Juke Box covered the song featuring vocalists Rayvon Owen and Olivia Kuper Harris and has registered more than a million views.   

But today we are featuring the earliest recording of Loesser.s song by thrush Margaret Whiting in 1947.  She was the protégé of singer/lyricist/record label executive Johnny Mercer who signed her to his Capital Records label in 1942 when she was just 13 years old.  Mercer helped her get established as a nightclub singer despite her youth and as a regular on radio.  He featured her as a vocalist on orchestras under contract with Capitol and eventually putting out her solo recordings.  At one point Whiting was a regular on no less than five radio programs at the same tune,  Two years after she recorded What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve she had a mega-hit duet Mercer on Baby It’s Cold Outside, a winter song that became a holiday standard.  

The French have a very deep tradition of Christmas carols.  In fact the word carol comes from French country dances that celebrated events throughout the year, but especially during Christmas.  Words were put to these lively dances creating songs very different from the announcement and nativity hymns sung for masses.  Coming from the peasantry the songs often celebrated the lowly witnesses or participants in the birth story—the carpenter and his humble teenage wife, the animals in the stable, the shepherds, children, and peasants.  Thus these carols were subtly subversive, claiming the Christ child as one of their own.  Exactly such a song is the very old carol Un flambeau, Jeannette, Isabelle—Bring a Torch, Jeannette, Isabella.

The song originated in Provence in southern France which includes not only famous vineyard country, but mountains rising to the Alps.  It was first published in 1553.  The melody now sung is attributed to Baroque composer Marc-Antoine Charpentier a century later but he probably adapted an older folk tune à boire Qu’ils sont doux, bouteille jolie from the now lost Le médecin malgré lui.

It was first translated in English in the mid-18th Century.

The song tells the story of two peasant girls who come upon the nativity and rush back to their village to tell the people and then leading them to the scene with torchesin the night.  At the stable all are awed and struck with silence so as not to disturb the baby’s sleep.

It is still a custom in Provence for children dressed as shepherds and milkmaids to carry torches and candles while singing the carol leading a procession on the way to Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve.

Today we feature a simple, lovely version by the Robert Shaw Chamber Singersfrom the album, Songs of Angels, Christmas Hymns & Carols.  Shaw was one of the best known conductors of the mid-20th Century leading symphony orchestras in Cincinnati, Ohio and Atlanta, Georgia but he is best known as a great innovator and popularizer of choral musicin many recordings by his Robert Shaw Chorale. The Chamber Singers were a smaller ensemble and their holiday recording was issued on the Telarc label in the late 1970s.  While he was in Cincinnati and Atlanta he also served as music director at local Unitarian Universalist churches and some of his armature church singers joined recordings by the Choral and Chamber Singers. 

Shaw was showered with honors in his lifetime including 14 Grammy Awards, the George Peabody Medal for service to American music, the U.S. National Medal for the Arts, the French Officier des Arts et des Lettres, and British Gramophone Award.  In 1981 he received the most prestigious American recognition in the Arts being selected for the Kennedy Center Honors.  He diedin 1999, in New Haven, Connecticut following a stroke, aged 82.

Quiz—What popular British Christmas favorite is actually a Welsh New Year’s carol in disguise?  Hint—it is one of the festive street caroling songs and also celebrates a pagan-ish Yule without any mention of Christmas or the Christ Child.  Answer—Deck the Halls!

The melody for the song comes from a Welsh winter or New Year’s carol probably dating to the 17th Century or earlier and first found in manuscript by Welsh harpist John Parry as Nos Galan (New Year’s Eve), in 1741 and published in Musical and Poetical Relicks of the Welsh Bards by Edward Jones in 1784.

The English words to Nos Galan began as follows:

Oh! how soft my fair one’s bosom,

fal lal lal lal lal lal lal lal la.

Oh! how sweet the grove in blossom,

fal lal lal lal lal lal lal lal la.

Oh! how blessed are the blisses,

[instrumental flourish]

Words of love, and mutual kisses,

fal lal lal lal lal lal lal lal la.

That titillating lyric was representative of the revelry associated with New Year’s.  Additional Welsh lyrics added later and translated literally without attempt to rhyme included reference to drinking:

The best pleasure on new year’s eve,

fal lal lal lal lal lal lal lal la.

Is house and fire and a pleasant family,

fal lal lal lal lal lal lal lal la.

A pure heart and brown ale,

fal lal lal lal lal lal lal lal la.

A gentle song and the voice of the harp

fal lal lal lal lal lal lal lal la.

The English lyrics were written by the Scottish musician Thomas Oliphant and first appeared in 1862, in Volume 2 of Welsh Melodies, a set of four volumes by John Thomas, and named Deck the Hall.  Note the singular form which referred to the common custom in Celtic societies like Wales, Scotland, and Brittany in France of decorating homes for New Year’s visiting and parties. 

Thomas’s collection included Welsh words by John Jones (Talhaiarn) which were once regarded as the source for Oliphant.  It was actually the other way around—Jones translated Oliphant’s version into Welsh. 

Oliphant’s song continued reference to drinking in the first verse and mentioned Christmas.  FYI—troul in the first verse means a round or lively folk song.

Deck the hall with boughs of holly,

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

'Tis the season to be jolly,

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

Fill the meadcup, drain the barrel,

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

Troul the ancient Christmas carol,

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

See the flowing bowl before us,

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

Strike the harp and join the chorus.

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

Follow me in merry measure,

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

While I sing of beauty's treasure,

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

Fast away the old year passes,

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

Hail the new, ye lads and lasses!

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

Laughing, quaffing all together,

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

Heedless of the wind and weather,

Fa, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!

An Americanversion of the lyrics published in the Pennsylvania School Journal in 1877 removed references to drinking replacing “Fill the meadcup…” with “Don we now our gay apparel”, “See the flowing bowl…” with “See the blazing Yule before Us”, and “Laughing, quaffing all together” with “Sing we joyous all together.”  It also replaced “ancient Christmas carol” with “ancient Yuletide carol.”  These are the lyrics usually sung in the United States.

The title was not pluralized to Deck the Halls until 1892.

The song was perfect for street caroling, parlor sing-alongs, and in public school holiday programs which could be skittish about religiouscarols.  It is also popular with neo pagans who sometimes seem to believe that the 19th Century English words are much more ancient and perhaps even pre-Christian.

Deck the Halls has been recorded many times.  Nat King Cole had a charted hit with his version and it launched the jazz/syntho-pop/New Age instrumentalists Mannheim Steamroller as an annual Holiday Season touring phenomenon in 1984.

Today’s version is from Nat King Cole’s 1960 Capitol Records LP The Magic of Christmas which was later re-mastered for stereoand issued as The Christmas Song three years later.  It was the best-selling Christmas album of the 1960s, and was certifiedby the RIAA for shipments of 6 million copies in the U.S.  The 1963 version reached #1 on Billboard’s Christmas Albums chart and remained for two weeks.  The song was included in several compilation records, was featured on Cole’s holiday TV specials and remains a perennial Christmas radio favorite.

Today is the third day of Kwanzaa which was created in 1966 during the blossoming of a period of Black Nationalism by Maulana Karenga, a Black studies scholarand a leading Los Angeles militant who was born  Ron Everett  in Parsonsburg, Maryland on July 14,1941

Beginning on December 26 and running through January 1, candles are lit representing African values.  Each of the values is given a Swahili name.  Today is day three— Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility)Kujichagulia “To build and maintain our community together and make our brothers’ and sisters’ problems our problems, and to solve them together.” 

Karenga was a graduate student in 1965 and already a veteran of several civil rights organizations when he became influenced by Malcom X in developing African-American unity, cultural pride, and a separatist militancy.  He was involved in many activities and organizations and was regarded as a rising intellectual leader.

Kwanzaa was designed in instill those values in a community he feared was still too dominated by “alien” white ideology and religion.  It was to “give Blacks an alternativeto the existing holiday and give Blacks an opportunity to celebrate themselves and their history, rather than simply imitate the practice of the dominant society.” The name is derived from the Swahili for first fruit celebration, matunda ya kwanza.

Karenga used Swahili as the ritual language of its operations because it is a pan-Africanlanguage, the most widely spoken of Sub-Saharan African tongues.  But it is an East African language as are the customs on which the celebration was based.  The vast majority of African-Americans trace their lineage to the trans-Atlantic slave trade and West Africa, very culturally and linguistically distinct from the east.  Critics in the Black community charged that he could have taken inspiration from instead from the West African empiresand kingdoms.  But Karenga was a student of Swahili and the east, and not of the slave trade or origins of his own people.

The celebration, centered around lighting candles in the home over seven days, obviously is borrowed from Jewish Chanukah traditions, but Karenga has barely acknowledged that obvious parallel.

Karenga at first frankly hoped that his new celebration would supplant Christmas and New Year’s, both in his opinion instruments of White oppression.  But the deep connection of the Black community to the Church and to its celebrations stood in the way of the spread of his new observance.  Also, his allies in nationalism among Muslims, both followers of Malcom X’s traditional Islam and the Nation of Islam—the Black Muslims—also objected to Karenga’s non-theism and hostility to religion.

After 1970 Karenga changed his tune and now emphasizes that it is a secular observationthat does not conflict with or contradict religious celebrations.  “Kwanzaa was not created to give people an alternative to their own religion or religious holiday,” he wrote in 1994.

With that adaptation, Kwanzaa began to spread rapidly.  It was easy for families to adopt for private observation.  Most of those families also have a Christmas tree in the corner.  Public observations came to include many at major Black Churches.

Candles are lit every night for the seven values.  Materials are available for study and reflection.  Songs and poems have been written.  The values are:

·       Umoja (Unity): To strive for and to maintain unity in the family, community, nation, and race.

·    Kujichagulia (Self-Determination): To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves, and speak for ourselves.

·     Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility): To build and maintain our community together and make our brothers’ and sisters’ problems our problems, and to solve them together.

·       Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics): To build and maintain our own stores, shops, and other businesses and to profit from them together.

·       Nia (Purpose): To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.

·    Kuumba (Creativity): To do always as much as we can, in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.

·      Imani (Faith): To believe with all our hearts in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders, and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.

The final night concludes with a feast and gift giving. 

The spread of the observance was aided, ironically, in no small part to the attention given it in the mainstream, white dominated media, especially local television news coverage in major urban centers.  The attention always made the celebration seem much more pervasive than it ever was.

Karenga himself became a controversial and polarizing figure among Black militants and nationalists.  The group that he founded in 1965 and led—US / Organization became a bitter rival to the Black Panther Party for leadership and influence in the West Coast African-American community.  That rivalry escalated into several episodes of violence including shootings, bombings, attacks on rival meetingsand at least four murders.

In 1971 Karenga was convicted of kidnapping and sexually torturing Deborah Jones and Gail Davis.  Karenga’s estranged wife, Brenda Lorraine Karenga, testified that she had participated in the abuse.  Karenga claimed that the women were plotting against him and were part of the FBI COINTELPRO harassment that sought to stoke divisions in the Black community.  He denied claims of abuse.

He was sentenced to ten years in prisonand held at the California Men’s Colonyuntil he was released with the support of high profile Black state politicians and office holders.  While he was in prison his organization fell apart and the reputation of Kwanzaa was damaged.  Karenga seldom speaks about the conviction, except to note that he was once a political prisoner.  The episode is left out of his autobiography and on the Kwanzaa web page.

Upon being released, Karenga devoted himself to an organization promoting Kwanzaa.  He finished one PhD. at United States International University(now Alliant International University) and a second at UCLA.  He is now the Chair of the Africana Studies Department at California State University, Long Beach, the Director of the Kawaida Institute for Pan African Studies, and the author of several books.

Despite its ups and downs, Kwanzaa remains meaningful and is an inspiration for many in the Black Community.  Several songshave been written for Kwanzaa, many of them for children to teach them the Seven Values represented by the candles. 

Today, however, we are sharing a song by Rita Marley, the widow and musical heir of Bob Marleythe reggae superstar, Jamaican nationalist, and Rastafari saint.  Cuban-born Alpharita Constantia Anderson was a back-up singer for Marley after two original members of the Wailers left the band under the name I Three.  After Marley’s death she launched her own career and worked tirelessly to preserve his memory.   Four of her children including Ziggy Marley have had significant musical careers of their own.

Rita’s 1984 song Harambee (working together for Freedom) has long been associated with Kwanzaa,                                              

The first Sunday after Christmas Day is a good day to present adoration carols, which naturally follow the hymns of announcement and nativity.  Although there is some overlap with the other two types, these songs are generally about those drawn to the manger  by the Herald Angels, Star, or simple word of mouthbeginning with the animals sharing the stable, those shepherds who abided in their fields, towns people (Bring a Torch Jeannette, Isabella,) children (Little Drummer Boy,) and ultimately the Magi.

What Child is This? was inspired by Renaissance paintings of the Adoration of the Shepherds and the lyrics ultimately paired  with the Medieval English ballad Greensleevesthe melody of which is sometimes attributed to King Henry VIII.

The lyrics were written by William Chatterton Dix, the manager of an insurance company after he was afflicted by an unexpected and severe illness that left him  bedridden and suffering from severe depression  in 1865.  It was published as a poem under the title The Manger Throne. 

What Child Is This? was published six years later in 1871, when it featured in Christmas Carols Old and New, the prestigious and influential collection of carols edited by Henry Ramsden Bramley and John Stainer.  It is not known with certainty who paired  three stanzasfrom the poem with the music from Greensleeves, The Christmas Encyclopedia by William D. Crump and Stories of the Great Christmas Carols both suggest that Stainer, who was also responsible for harmonizing the musical setting may have done so.

Despite its very English origins the song is much more popularin the United States than in the land that gave it birth, perhaps because Brits are much more aware of Greensleeves original words, a romp suggesting a summer seduction.

Many versions have been recorded by choirs and solo artists including Johnny Mathis, Andrea Bocelli, Marina McBride, Carrie Underwood, and Chris Tomlin.  Today we feature a recording by semi-classical singer, Broadway star, pop phenomenon, and heart throb Josh Groban.

Today is the second day of the 12 Days of Christmas, a day with multiple personalities as we will see.  We will celebrate with a brand new setting of an English carol about a Bohemian princeling/saint.

The Brits and the residentsof other former pink blotches on Queen Victoria’s globe like many Americans would usually spend today, Boxing Day, storming the malls and shopson what is usually the busiest retail sales day of the year, but, alas are subject this year to the strictest of Coronaviris lock-downs.  Disgruntled gift recipients used to hit the refund and exchange desks others spent the gift cards and even old fashion cash.   But unlike most Yanks they did it on an official National Holiday as a paid day off.  Officially December 26 is just another Bank Holiday.  But Boxing Day is a treasured tradition with long and deep roots.

The celebration in the British Isles owes its origins to the aristocracy, gentry, and wealthy townsmen and their households.  The master would give presents to his servants and staff, who would also have the day off work.  Sometimes the master’s family would even serve meals to their inferiors!  Needless to say, this custom was very popular among the servants, and sometimes observed resentfully by those unaccustomed to either manual labor or generosity.

It is also a remnant of an ancient tradition that may—or may not—go back to the Roman celebrations of Saturnalia and Sol Invictus, when there was a carnival-like turn around with slaves lording over masters for a day.  The tradition continued into the Middle Ageson into Elizabethan times, where it took on the wild excesses of street revelry.

That revelry doomed the whole seasonwhen Oliver Cromwell and his Puritans took over.  Eventually, Boxing Day restored a controlled dollop of the old festival.  The Church of England gave a religious cover to the day as St. Stephen’s Day. 

Stephen was the Deacon of Jerusalem the earliest days of Christianity known for his charities to the poor.  He was also the first Christian martyr, stoned to death for allegedly preaching the Trinity in the Temple.

The familiar carol Good King Wenceslas is a St. Stephen’s Day song meant for street begging.  In Ireland, the day is still officially called St. Stephen’s Day.

It is also known there as Wren’s Day there.  Boys in homemade hats and costumes carry a caged wren—or sometime a dead one pierced by a holly sprig—proclaiming it the king of the birds and begging for treats.  Once a fading country custom, in the cities men now re-enact it—often as a pub crawl.

In the Bank Holidays Act of 1871, Parliament recognized Boxing Day as a Bank Holiday—an officially recognized public holiday.  While time off from work was not originally mandatory, but has become nearly universal.

The holiday spread across the Empire and is still official in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and other Commonwealth countries.  In South Africa it was re-named The Day of Goodwill in 1994.

Today small gifts are still given trades people and service workers, but in Britain the day has become all about shopping.  It is the biggest shopping day of the year and has been compared to American Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving.  Stores mark the day with huge sales.

It is also a day of sport.  Football—that’s soccer to Americans—and Rugby leagues would hold full schedules of games, teams usually playing their most serious rivals.  There would also prestige horse races and for the country gentry mounted fox hunts—more recently due to a bitterly resented law, sansfox.  The toffs are no longer allowed to chase real fox, but still got to ride to the houndschasing a scented bait.

The carol Good King Wenceslas is most closely associated with St. Stephen’s Day along with the street begging We Wish You a Merry Christmas and The Wren’s Song in Ireland. 

Good King Wenceslas is a Christmas carol that tells a story of a Bohemian ruler going on a journeyand braving harsh winter weather to give alms to a poor peasanton the Feast of Stephen.  During the journey, his page is about to give up the struggleagainst the cold weather, but is enabled to continue by following his master’s footprints through the deep snow.

The legend is based on the life of the historical Saint Wenceslaus I, Duke of Bohemia who was murdered and martyred in 935. Wenceslas was considered a martyr and saint immediately after his death, when a cult grew up in Bohemia and in England. Within a few decades, four biographiesof him were in circulation which had a powerful influence on the High Middle Ages concept of the rex justus (righteous king), a monarch whose power stems mainly from his great piety as well as his princely power.

In 1853, English hymn writer John Mason Neale wrote the lyrics to Good King Wenceslas in collaborating with his music editor Thomas Helmore.  The carol first appeared in Carols for Christmas-Tide. Neale’s word were set to the melody of a 13th-century spring carol Tempus adest floridum (The time is near for flowering) first published in the 1582 Finnish collection Piae Cantiones.  The very old origins of the melody give the song an appropriately medieval cast that makes it popular with modern madrigal singers.

The song has been recorded many times notably by Mel Tormé and Canadian Celtic singer Loreena McKennitt.  It was modernized with a synthesizerand orchestra instrumental version by Mannheim Steamroller.  The most popular version in Britain and Ireland is by the Canadian/Irish folk quartet The Irish Rovers. 

But today we are introducing an entirely now choral setting for the old lyrics.  Composer David Rain “wanted to create a different ‘feel’ to the story, to take it back in time to its origins in the Middle Ages—hence the medieval feel of the piece.  I also felt that since the Wenceslas story is all about a journey, a setting in 3/4 time would create a better sense of that feeling, rather than the traditional 4/4.

Rain dedicated to the piece to his uncle Duncan Shaw of Vancouver, who, as a retirement project, has developed his own theory of gravity.  He “has been a huge inspiration in my own compositional journey late in life.

Rain worked for 40 years in the fields of international development and refugee support, living in the East African country of Tanzania for 10 years. From 1993 to 2015, he worked for USC Canada (the Unitarian Service Committee) and has created a blog in honor of USC’s founder, beloved humanitarian Lotta Hitschmanova. In his mid-60s, as a retirement project, he caught the composing bug and has now written or arranged23 different songs for choirs.

This version of the song was recorded by Matthew Curtis, formerly of Chanticleer.

Note—The two-fer on Christmas Day includes two great American carols with echoing significance today.

The first carol is my own personal favorite.  I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day is unusual in that there is no reference to the Christ child, manger, Holy Family, shepherds, Magi, or even the Herald Angels.  Instead if focuses on the message of those angels amid the ghastly carnage of war.  It was written not by famed Unitarian hymnist Samuel Longfellow, but by his brother Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, then America’s most honored and adored poet who had created national epics like The Courtship of Miles Standish, The Song of Hiawatha, and Evangeline as well as the school recital pieces The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere and The Village Blacksmith.

Longfellow was 56 years old, teaching at Harvard, and living in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1863.  He had lost his beloved second wife, Frances Elizabeth Appleton, two years earlier in a grizzly accident when her dress caught on fire.  To compound his sorrow the Civil War was raging.  Like many New Englanders he was an ardent opponent of slavery but had also embraced pacifism since the Mexican War.  He was deeply conflicted about the war.  His eldest son, Charles Appleton Longfellow, had enlisted in the Union Army in March against his father’s wishes and was commissioned a Lieutenant.  Charles was severely woundedin November at the   Battle of New Hope Church in Virginia.  The young man’s life hung in the balance.

But just before Christmas Longfellow got word that his son would survive.  On Christmas morning, hearing the local church bells ring, the poet set down and wrote I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day.  It was as much an anguished plea for peace as it was a conventional Christmas piece.

I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day

I heard the bells on Christmas Day
Their old, familiar carols play,
    And wild and sweet
    The words repeat
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
    Had rolled along
    The unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Till ringing, singing on its way,
The world revolved from night to day,
    A voice, a chime,
    A chant sublime
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Then from each black, accursed mouth
The cannon thundered in the South,
    And with the sound
    The carols drowned
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

It was as if an earthquake rent
The hearth-stones of a continent,
    And made forlorn
    The households born
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And in despair I bowed my head;
“There is no peace on earth,” I said;
    “For hate is strong,
    And mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!”

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
    The Wrong shall fail,
    The Right prevail,
With peace on earth, good-will to men.”

—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The poem was first published in Our Young Folks, a juvenile magazine published by Ticknor and Fields of Boston in February 1865 as the war was entering its bloody final months.

It was not set to music until an English organist, John Baptiste Calkin, used the poem in a processionalaccompanied with a melody, the Waltham, which he had used for another hymn in 1848.  Although other settings were used, Calkin’s became for many years the standard and remains the version most heard in Britain and Commonwealth countries.

In published texts of the song two of Longfellow’s verses that most directly referred to the Civil War are usually omitted making the song more universal.

In 1952 Christmas music specialist Johnny Marks departed from his usual novelty songs for children like Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer to create a lovely and reverent new melody for Longfellow’s words which has become the new standard in the United States.  In 1956 Bing Crosby had a mid-level hit with the song and joked to Marks “You finally got a decent lyricist.”

Other notable recording of the Marks version were made by Kate Smith, Frank Sinatra, Harry Belafonte, Burl Ives, and Johnny Cash.  But this morning we feature the simple beauty of the song and lyrics in the lovely voice of Karen Carpenter for The Carpenters’ 1984 Christmas Collection album.

By far the most beloved and sung of all Western Christmas carols is Silent Night.  It will be sung tonight at Catholic midnight masses, candlelight services like the Tree of Life’s virtual one on Zoom, by hardy carolers in neighborhood streets, in many versions on Holiday radio, and in family roomsaround the Christmas tree.

Two hundred and two years ago Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht was first performed at St. Nicholas parish church in the village Oberndorf on the Salzach River in the Austrian Empire.  Today Silent Night is by far the most popular traditional Christmas carol in the English speaking world, and has been translated from the original German into more than 140 languages.  It has been recorded by choirs, orchestras, and solo musicians in every possible genrebut Bing Crosby’s 1935 version is the bestselling solo rendition of all time.

A young priest, Father Joseph Mohr, wrote a poemin 1816 at Mariapfarr, the hometown of his father in the Salzburg Lungau region.  Two years later he had been posted as parish priest to the Oberndorf.  Circumstances of the creation of the song are hazy but the commonly told story goes like this.

Mohr was in need of a song for his Christmas Eve mass, but the church organwas damaged by a flood.  He needed something simple that could be sung to his guitar.  He thought of his poem and asked his organist Franz Xaver Gruber to set it to music.  The result was a lovely, simple tune that was easy to sing and was more of a lullaby to the infant Jesusthan the triumphant announcement carols commonly sung on Christmas Eve.

The song charmed Karl Mauracher, an organ builder who serviced the instrument at the Oberndorf church, who copied the song and introduced it to two travelling families of folk singers, the Strassers and the Rainerswho were singing it in their shows in 1819.  The Rainers once performed the song for audience that included Emperor Franz I of Austria and Czar Alexander Iof Russia.  They also introduced the song to America in an 1839 concert in New York City.

The first edition of the song was published by Friese in 1833 in a collection of Four Genuine Tyrolean Songs.

The song was already beloved in the German speaking countries and was spreading across Europe.  Although Gruber was generally acknowledged as composer some people could not believe it could have been written by such a rustic provincial and attributed it variously to Haydn, Mozart, or Beethoven.  Mohr’s role as lyricist was largely forgotten outside stories told around Oberndorf.  But in 1995 a manuscript by Gruber dating to around 1820 was discovered and authenticated confirming Mohr as the author.

In 1859, the Episcopal priest John Freeman Young of Trinity Church in New York City, wrote and published the English translation that is most frequently sung today, translated from three of Mohr's original six verses.  His version of the melody varied slightly from Gruber’s original.  Soon the song was as popular in English speaking countries as it was in German.

My poem Let Us Be That Stable was inspired by traditional nativity scenes in art and family crèches.  It was first read at a Christmas Eve service at the old Congregational Unitarian Church in Woodstock more than 20 years ago and was included in my 2004 collection of poetry, We Build Temples in the Heart.  It is my most widely reproduced poem and has frequently been used in Unitarian Universalist and other worships settings since and us often used with the singing of Silent Night

Let Us Be That Stable 

Today, let us be that stable

Let us be the place

            that welcomes at last

            the weary and rejected,

            the pilgrim stranger,

            the coming life.

Let not the frigid winds that pierce

            our inadequate walls,

            or our mildewed hay,

            or the fetid leavings of our cattle

            shame us from our beckoning.

Let our outstretched arms

            be a manger

            so that the infant hope,

swaddled in love,

may have a place to lie.

Let a cold beacon

            shine down upon us

            from a solstice sky

            to guide to us

            the seekers who will come.

Let the lowly Shepard

            and all who abide

            in the fields of their labors

            lay down their crooks

            and come to us.

Let the seers, sages, and potentates

            of every land

            traverse the shifting dunes

            the rushing rivers,

            and the stony crags

            to seek our rude frame.

Let herdsmen and high lords

            kneel together

            under our thatched roof

            to lay their gifts

            before Wonder. 

Today, let us be that stable.

—Patrick Murfin

There are so many wonderful renditions of Silent Night in English and German, by choirs, a capela groups, bands and orchestras, and soloists that it is hard to pick just one.  So almost at random, here is Celtic Women in their annual Christmas concert recorded at The Helix in Dublin, Ireland in 2013.

Note—Both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day deserve bonus two-fer entries!

In churches around the world this evening announcement carols will be central to the services.   Many are bold and glorious whether sung by massed choirs or by congregations that know them by heart.  Adeste Fideles (O Come All Ye Faithful) and the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel’s Messiah are two of the grander example, although there are plenty of others in Christmas song books  but my personal favorite is much more modest.

It Came Upon a Midnight Clear is one of the oldest and most beloved of American Christmas carols.  It also never mentions the Christ Child but instead is all about the announcement that the angles made to the shepherds.  It was a not-so-subtle message for Americans who had just concluded a war that the author considered horribly unjust and immoral.

The Rev. Edmund Hamilton Sears, a Unitarian minister wrote the words to It Came Upon a Midnight Clear to celebrate "Peace on earth, goodwill to men" in the wake of the Mexican war.  Its popularity has grown and faded depending on American involvement in other wars.

Rev. Edmund Hamilton Sears was the minster of the Unitarian Church inWayland, Massachusetts in 1849.  It was a small congregation and a not-very-important-pulpit in the insular world of New England Unitarianism.  But like many of his peers Sears had been an ardent opponent of the just concluded Mexican War.  He considered it indefensible land grab by a powerful nation against a weak one.  It also had ramifications for his oppositionto slavery.  The most voracious War Hawks intended the newly conquered lands to eventually enter the Union as slave states and thus swing the balance of power in the nation permanently to the South.  And like other Unitarian ministers, the war confirmed Sears in a growing pacifism.

The war had concluded with the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo signed in February 1848 and ratified by the two nations by that May.  Under its terms Mexico lost nearly half of its territoryincluding all or parts of the future states of California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Kansas, Colorado, Oklahoma, and New Mexico.

It was still weighing heavily on Sears’ mind when his friend Rev. William Parsons Lunt of First Parish Church in Quincy, Massachusetts asked him to write something for a Sunday school pageant.  Sears played and sang the song to friends and parishioners in his own parlor on Christmas Eve of 1849.  It isn’t known to what tune it was sung.

Sears ever after called carol his “little angels song.”

The next year Richard Storrs Willis, a composer who trained under Felix Mendelssohn, wrote the melody that quickly became most widely known tune to the song used in the United States.  With that tune it was added to the hymnals of not only the Unitarians, but Universalists, Episcopalians, Methodists, Lutherans, and most other Protestant denominations.

But in England and the Commonwealth nations It Came Upon a Midnight Clear is sung to a melody called Noel by Sir Arthur Sullivan of Gilbert and Sullivan fame.

Today we will enjoy the version by the great Ella Fitzgerald whose albums of Christmas music have become almost as important to the canon of great holiday recordings as those of Bing Crosby.

There was a whole genre of World War II separation songs that have become enduring classics of 20th Century popular music.  Think I’ll Be Seeing You, The White Cliffs of Dover, and Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree to name just a few examples.  And of course there was a sub-genre of Christmas songs.  Irving Berlin’s White Christmas, the most popular adult secular holidaysong of all time, was written before the American entry into the War inspired by a hot day in Los Angeles.  But its record release by Bing Crosby in late 1941 and his crooning the tune in Paramount Picture’s Holiday Inn in 1942 struck a nerve with G.I.s far from home and many in desert or tropical locations.  I have written about how my Father, W.M. Murfinplayed it for the men of his Army Field Hospital and its patients in North Africa in ’42.

But another Crosby recording struck an even more direct chord with GIs and their families back home—I’ll Be Home For Christmas and this year of Coronavirus forced separations makes it more relevant than ever.

I’ll Be Home for Christmas was written by lyricist Kim Gannon and composer Walter Kent and recorded on October 1, 1943 by Bing Crosby with the John Scott Trotter Orchestra on Decca Records. Within a month of release, the song charted for 11 weeks, with a peak at #3. The next year, it reached #16.   It soon became a perennial on Christmas radio and after Billboard established a separate seasonal chart for air play it was frequently near the top.  The song was also featured on Crosby’s famous 1945 78 rpm albumand it’s LP release in 1949 which has itself been re-released and re-mastered several more times.

Crosby won his fifth Gold Record and it became the most requested song at Christmas U.S.O. shows. The GI magazineYanksaid Crosby “accomplished more for military morale than anyone else of that era.”  But the British feared the song would actually lower morale and initially banned it on the BBC.  After the tide turned in the Allies favor, the ban was lifted.

After the initial release there was a copyright dispute when Buck Ram, later the manager and producer of The Platterssaid he had previously written a poem with the same name and theme.  Although the lyrics and music of the released version were entirely different, Decca lawyers feared that they could not prove that Gannon and Kent may not have been inspired by the title.  After the initial release Ram was credited as a co-writer and shared in the considerable royalties the song generated.

I’ll Be Home for Christmas has been covered by many most notably by Johnny Mathis on his seminal Merry Christmas album in 1958.  Other covers have included The Carpenters, Elvis Presley, Reba McIntyre, Rascal Flats, Josh Groban, Michael Bublé, and Kelly Clarkson.

 As fine as many of those versions are, Der Bingle’s remains the most heartfelt.

Since tiny, teenage Brenda Lee belted out Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree in 1958 there has been a mixed bag of Rock & Roll Christmas music.  That song had the edge of being co-writtenby Christmas music specialist Johnny Marks, the creator of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.  There have been a lot of shots fired at the elusive goal of becoming a seasonal perennial but there have been way more misses than hits.  Although not so ubiquitous as country music stars Christmas albums, plenty of rockers from Elvis Presley to some death metal bands have tried to get into the game.

In the ‘50s and early ‘60s the most successful holiday sides were basically novelty tunes like Lee’s.  Notably success included Chuck Berry’s Run, Run Rudolph, rockabilly Bobby Helms’ Jingle Bell Rock, and the Beach Boys’ recasting The Little Duce Coup into The Little Saint Nick.

But that began to change in 1963 with Phil Spector’s wall of sound Christmas album.  It notably included Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) by Darlene Love which Rolling Stone rated as the greatest Rock Christmas song of all time.  Unfortunately the album droppedon the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated and was swamped nearly to oblivion.  None of the songs on the album charted originally.  Over time the album and the song became cult favorites.  It got a huge boost in 1986 when David Letterman featured Love belting out the song the final new episodebefore Christmas.  He made it a tradition that lasted 27 years with ever more elaborate productions.

The Beatles got into Christmas music with annual almost throw away ditties meant as audio Christmas cards to fans.  Later both John Lennon and Paul McCartney had their own holiday hits.  Lennon’s Happy Xmas (The War is Over) in 1971 was a great rocking protest song and was produced by Phil Spector.  In 1979 McCartney stuck gold with Simply Having a Wonderful Christmas Time, which has made it to Christmas radio play lists but has also been derided as “the worst Christmas song of all time.”  Believe me, it isn’t as long as Dominick the Donkey or The Christmas Shoes still turn up.

For sheer star power and more than a dollop of self-importance nothing matches Irish rocker Bob Geldoph’s assembly of Rock and Pop superstars on Do They Know its Christmas in 1984 to raise money for famine relief in Ethiopia.

Mariah Cary’s diva performance on All I Want For Christmas Is You became the first new Christmas song in years to become a seasonal standard in 1994.  The infectious earworm has finally passed Bing Crosby’s White Christmas as the most played holiday song on radio as well as the biggest seller.

There are undoubtedly others that deserve mention.  But for sheer raw Rock and Roll powernothing matches the 1975 live recording of Santa Claus is Coming to Town by Bruce Springsteen and the E-Street Bandincluding Little Stevie—Steve Van Zant—and saxophonist Clarence Clemmons.  There is something playful and joyful in this rocker.

The song long predated Rock & Roll.  It was written by J. Fred Coots and Haven Gillespie and became a huge hit for Eddie Cantor after he featured it on his weekly radio program in 1934.  It has been recorded by over 200 artists, including Bing Crosby and The Andrews Sisters, The Crystals, Frank Sinatra, The Temptations,  The Jackson 5, Mariah Carey, Neil Diamond, Chris Isaak, and Michael Bublé.  It was also the title song of the Rankin and Bass 1970 animated TV special with Fred Astaire narrating the origin of Santa Claus.

For sheer infectious ebullience, Springsteen’s version blasts all others out of the water. 

Not only is today the Winter Solstice, it is the much anticipated Great Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn—the two largest planets in the Solar System early this season.  If your sky is clear the two celestial bodies will seem to merge into a single bright object when observed low in the southwestern sky about an hour after sunset.  This extremely rare event has been hyped as the Christmas Star, and in fact some believe that a much earlier appearance may have been what the shepherdsand the Magi saw.

It has been nearly 400 years since the planets passed this close to each other in the sky—1623 just 13 years after Galileoobserved them through a telescope and nearly 800 years since the alignment occurred at night so that everyone could see it in 1226, when artisans were still building Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris and Genghis Khan held sway over Asia.

In the year 7 B.C.E they lined up, as seen from Earth, in May, September and early December in a rare triplet, astronomers say. At those junctures, though, the planets were relatively far apart and would have appeared much dimmer than the one expected tonight.  But since historians have noted that in ancient Israelshepherds only “abided in the fields” in the spring lambing season when wolves threatened the flocks, the May congruence is considered a candidate to be the Christmas Star.

Others, however, have speculated that a much brighter conjunction of Jupiter and much nearer-by Venus in 2 B.C.E. is a more likely suspect.  Since the exact year of the Nativity is not known—it could have occurred any time in a nearly 10 year window on either side of the B.C.E/A.C.E divide.

Tonight the closest alignment Neptune and Jupiter will appear just a tenth of a degree apart.  Although from our vantage point on Earththe huge gas giants will appear very close together, but they will remain hundreds of millions of miles apart in space. And while the conjunction is happening on the same day as the Winter Solstice, the timing is merely a coincidence, based on the orbits of the planets and the tilt of the Earth.

All in all the excitement is understandable.  That coincidence and the Christmas Star story have brought hopein the darkest hour of the year of the Coronavirus to many Christians, New Agers, and even the conventionally non-religious.

However some Fundamentalist Christians—the sort who deny evolution; insist cosmos, Earth, life, and human beings were all Created by God in seven days; that Jonah lived in the belly of whale; and Joshua stopped the Sun—are angry that anyone would dare suggest that the Star was not a literal star and did not miraculously appear to lead the Magi to Bethlehem.  Their resentment is fueled even further because scientistsare members of a satanic elite expounding Fake News about climate change, the global coronavirus pandemic, and vaccines. Trumpism has added a doseof rage to their long-standing science denial.

But all of the Christmas Star chatter is reason enough to trot out The Star Carol, relatively modern American carol.  It was the last of 15 carols composed by jazz musician Alfred S. Burt between 1942 and ’55 which he shared privately as annual gifts to his family and friends.  The lyrics were written by Wihla Hutson, a friend and the organist at the Episcopal church in Pontiac, Michigan where his father was rector.  The only public performance of one of the carols during Burt’s life was in a service at the church.

The Star Carol was the last of the songs, completed just two days before Burt died in 1954 at the early age of 34.

Burt was living and working in California and working as an arranger for the Alveno Rey Orchestra when he asked the Blue Reys, vocal group with the band to sing it to test the harmonies of his latest composition in 1952.  They liked it and played it at the annual Christmas Party of the King Sisters.  One of the singing sisters, Donna, was married to James Conkling, then President of Columbia Records.  He liked it so well that he arranged a recording session with a full choir at the North Hollywood Latter Day Saints Churchin late 1953 which the terminally ill Burt directed from a wheel chair.  After Burt’s death additional recordings were made at St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church in Studio City. 

For the 1954 Christmas season Columbia released a The Christmas Mood, 10-inch 33 rpm album including most of the carols and in 1957 came out with a 12 inch LP which included more songs for total of 12 and added an instrumental brass ensemble on a medley of the carols arranged and conducted by Ralph Carmichael.

All 14 of the carols were not issued on one recording until 1964 when James Conkling who had moved on the presidency of Warner Bros. Records released This Is Christmas: A Complete Collection of the Alfred S. Burt Carols by the Voices of Jimmy Joyce.  The album was nominated for a Grammy.

Caroling, Caroling and Some Children See Him are the two most popular of Burt’s carols.  The In 1958, Tennessee Ernie Ford made The Star Carol the title song for his first full-length album of Christmas music.   

Ford was a unique country music star.  The classically trained base/baritone, World War II bombardier, and post-war radio disc jockeyadopted an exaggerated hillbilly personacalled Cousin Ernie with the catch phrase “bless his pea-pickin’ heart” for his radio program and took it to other country music shows where he sang.  The character was featured in a three episode arc on the I Love Lucy Show.  He had early recording success with up-beat boogie-woogies and his biggest hitwas his memorable version of Merle Travis’s coal mining ballad Sixteen Tons. In 1955 he recorded The Ballad of Davy Crockett which reached #4 on the country music chart.

From 1956-1961 he hosted his own prime-time TV variety program, The Ford Show, which ran on NBC.  On the program he changed his image, toning down and then virtually eliminating the bumpkin act.  He eschewed the cowboy hats and spangled attire of many Country acts for sharply tailored suits, razor cut hair, and his signature pencil moustache.  Despite the objections of both the network and his sponsor Ford Motor Company he ended each program with a gospel song. The hymns like The Old Rugged Cross and Were You There When they Crucified My Lord became the most popular feature on the show.

That led to an album, Hymns, in 1956 which remained on Billboard’s Top Album chartsfor 277 consecutive weeks, The Star Carol in ’58, and a string of other religious albums including Great Gospel Songs which won a Grammy1964.

After his prime time series ended Ford moved to Northern California and hosted an ABC daytime talk/variety show from KGO-TV in San Francisco from 1962. 

Despite all of his success years of heavy drinking began to take a toll on his health and voice.  He left his long-time Capitol Records home in 1975 and never again had recording success despite continuing to show u as a guest star on the Mandrel Sisters, Dolly Parton, and Dinah Shoreprograms.

On September 28, 1991, Ford suffered severe liver failure at Dulles Airportshortly after leaving a state dinnerat the White House, hosted by President George H. W. Bush. He died in a Reston, Virginia, hospital on October 17.

Note—Today we will feature a two-fer!  First, in honor of the Winter Solstice and a second post honoring the Christmas Star planetary convergence this evening.

Call it Solstice, Yule, Meán Geimhridh, or any name you choose, today is the shortest day and longest night of the year—the official beginning of winter. Tomorrow the Sun begins its annual return. Despite claims otherwise, Solstice is the Reason for the Season—the overt or disguised inspiration of most Northern Hemisphere Festivals of Lightclustered around this date. To celebrate we turn to Jethro Tull’s classic 1977 album Songs from the Woods, Ian Anderson’s turn from jazz-infused rock to an embrace of his English roots and folk identities is a fitting carol for the day.

Today, the Solstice—the moment when in the Northern Hemisphere when has its maximum tilt away from the Sun will occur at 4:02 CST.  You can calculate it for your time zone.

In most so-called pagan traditions around the Northern Hemisphere there were two ways to celebrate the Solstice.  Some lit firesin the darkest night to summon the return of the Sun.  Others gathered at dawnto in some way capture the first light of that return.  The latter often involved human construction on or in which that light would strike a significant stone or altar.  Think pyramids in Egypt and the pre-Columbian Americas, Stonehenge, Greek temples, medicine wheels, certain Medieval Cathedrals, and far simpler wooden structures in Northern Europe and Siberia.  Either way, those who observe or re-createsuch rituals have found a way to do so.

Even if you do not observe the pagan doings—or shun them as the devil’s work—chances are that you to have been or will be celebrating the solstice yourself. 

Buried in traditionalfolklore, swathed in symbolism, and steeped in metaphor, Christmas and Chanukah share the same impulses as Yule and its Celticand ancient British cousins, Meán Geimhridh and Meán Geimhridhh beloved by contemporary neo-pagans of one stripe or another.  At their corethere was in each of them a physical or metaphorical re-kindlingof the light at the darkest hour of the year offering a glimmering of hope at a time of cold and starvation. 

Archeological evidence shows that the event—the shortest day and longest night of the year, when the sun’s daily maximum elevation in the sky is the lowest—was marked, often using physical constructions to capture the rising sun, in Neolithic times across widely separated cultures in Europe, the Near East, Asia, and North America.  Stonehenge is just the most famous example.  

While the trappings of Christmas—the Yule log, the holly and the ivy, the Christmas tree, mistletoe, wassailingand other customs are commonly knownto be borrowed from pagan celebrations, the metaphor of the birth of theSon, bringing light and salvation to the world is often overlooked.  Among still nervous orthodox Christians, drawing parallels to pagan belief is still actively discouraged.

The early Church actively squelched efforts to confabulate the Feast of the Nativity with the Festival of Sol Invictus, introduced to the Roman Empire in the Third Century under the Emperor Elagabalus.  It was a religious revolution that briefly upended Jupiter as the primary Roman God and put in his place the Invincible Sun, which combined the characteristics and cult practices of several sun godsincluding Syrian Elah-Gabal, the Greek Apollo, and Mithras, a soldier god of Persianorigin. 

The feast was set on December 25, during the Roman holiday period following Saturnalia.  Later, under the Emperor Aurelian as Christianity grew in influence and importance, attempts were made to incorporate worship of the Christ child into the cult as an incarnation of Sol.  When the Church became ascendantin the Empire, it did all it could to squelch the festival, but like many popular pagan customs, it was so integrated into many daily livesthat it inevitably influenced how Christmas, by then assigned to the same calendar day, was observed. 

Ian Anderson is a Scottish born multi-instrumentalist and singerbest known as the creative forcebehind the innovative and influential British folk/jazz/fusion/progressive rock band Jethro Tull.  Many of the band’s best known songs evoke a magical, even mystical spirit.  That is certainly the case in Ring Out Solstice Bells featuring percussion and Anderson’s signature flute.

Today is the last Sunday of Advent and time for one more carol special to the season of anticipation and hope.  Today’s song is one of the oldest in the English Protestant tradition.  It was one of literally thousands of hymn lyrics written by Charles Wesley (1707-1788), the brother of John Wesley, founder of Methodism.  The prolific hymnist almost single handedly established the tradition of congregational singing among Methodists and by osmosis much of the rest of English language Protestantism. 

In 1744 Wesley considered the Old Testament Book of Haggai, chapter 2: verse 7 and compared it to the desperate situation of orphans around him and the class divide in England.  Come, Thou long expected Jesus published as a prayer at the time with the words:

Born Your people to deliver,

born a child and yet a King,

born to reign in us forever,

now Your gracious kingdom bring.

By Your own eternal Spirit,

rule in all our hearts alone;

by Your all sufficient merit,

raise us to Your glorious throne.

Wesley adapted his prayer into a hymn published it in his Hymns for the Nativity of our Lord and wrote it with an eye toward preparing for the Second Coming of Christ. 

Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus has been set to a number of tunes. It is not known which melody Wesley originally intended for the hymn, which is why it was excludedfrom the Methodist Weslyan Hymn Book, until the 1875 Edition.  There is some evidence that the first tune it was set to was Stuttgart by Christian Friedrich Witt written in 1716.  Later Hyfrydol, a Welsh tune written in the 1800s by Rowland Hugh Prichard, was frequently used.  In the United Kingdom, it is now often set to the 4-line tune Cross of Jesus, by John Stainer, part of longer his work The Crucifixion.

Unitarian Universalists will recognize Prichard’s tune as the melody for My Blue Boat Home, the signature song of UU bard Peter Mayer.

Today’s selection by the Christian/folk ensemble Red Mountain uses the Prichard melody.

The pages are flying off the calendar like in those old movies as we near Christmas.  It’s time to consider the most urban of what might be called the secular advent songs from the Golden Age of American holiday music.  Like It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas and other songs it captures the vibrancy, bustle, color, and excitement of the season but sets it on the crowded streets of a big city.  Other songs captured nostalgia for by-gone Christmases, country villages, and sleigh rides but Silver Bells, sometimes called City Sidewalks, was set squarely in the modern post-World War II era.

In the year of the Coronavirus pandemic, those bustling sidewalks themselves seem a nostalgic glimpse of a vanished era.  This year most city streets are nearly deserted gone are the Volunteers of America Santas and the Salvation Army can’t recruit nearly enough attendants for their Red Kettles.  Those that are out, mostly in front of suburban strip mall stores have to offer the option of swiping credit cards to those afraid of the human contact of throwing coins or stuffing bills into the Kettles.  Those Silver Bells are mostly silent.

The song writing team of Jay Livingston and Ray Evans were commissioned to produce a song for the movie The Lemmon Drop Kid in 1950.  The pair specialized in songs for film and their hits included Buttons and Bows for the The Paleface, Mona Lisa for Captain Carey, U.S.A., and Que Sera, Sera for The Man Who Knew Too Much, and Tammy for Tammy and the Bachelor.   After Buttons and Bows won an Oscar for the Bob Hope and Jane Russell vehicle with in 1947 Paramount Studios was eager to have the pair work on a song for Hope’s new movie.

Lyricist Evans first titled the song Tinkle Bells but in an oft told anecdote he described being calledoff by his horrified wife who reminded him of the mom slang for wee wee. 

As was so often the case, Bing Crosby first recorded the song with Carol Richards while the movie was in post-production.  It hit the charts in October of 1950.  In an already shot scene the song was almost a throw away with guff voicedvaudevillian William Frawley singing and the stars Hope and Marilyn Maxwell briefly chiming in.  With the success of the record Hope and Maxwell were called back to shoot a more elaborate street scene version with them carrying most of the song.

Released in 1951 The Lemon Drop Kid was based on one of Damon Runyon’s Broadway short Stories.  The title character was a small time race track tout and swindler who got into a jam with a gangster and had to raise $10,000 by Christmas or he “won’t see New Year’s Eve.”  The kid concocted a phony charity scam featuring street corner Santas collecting money for an Old Dolls retirement home.  Abetted by his trusting girlfriend, even assembled a bunch of old dolls—former girl friends of cheap hoods, chorines, and hostesses at mob joints—and plunked them down in an abandoned casino.  Needless to say, complications arose with both cops and gangsters closing in but the Kid determined to win back his disillusioned girlfriend and out of a genuine affection for the Old Dolls however reluctantly did the right thing and everyone lived happily ever after. 

Hope reprised the song, which had become almost a second theme song behind Thanks for the Memories, on his annual television Christmas specials in the ‘60’s through the ‘90’s teaming up with such guest stars as Gale Storm, Olivia Newton-John, Marie Osmond, Dolly Parton, Reba McEntire, and his own wife Dolores Hope on his final original special in 1993.

Silver Bells has been covered by a host of artists becoming a staple of many holiday albums and seasonal specials.  Among them are Doris Day, Dean Martin, The Supremes, Elvis Pressley, Anne Murray, the Oakridge Boys, Martina McBride, Mariah Carey, Reba McEntire, and Michael Bublé. 

But by the 21st Century the song had become as much a nostalgia piece as the sleigh ride songs of fifty years earlier.  Even before the pandemic the urban street scene that Hope and Maxwell strolled with its thick crowds of shoppers, street vendors, cops on the beat, and now embarrassing ethnic stereotypes has long vanished.  It was supplanted first by the suburban mega malls and big box stores and now even those are now falling victim to on-line shopping.  Busy street life has been replaced by the isolation of the computer and smart phone.

So let’s go back to the original movie scene. 

We are closing in on the big day and haven’t honored some of the greatest secular songs from the Golden Age of American Christmas Music.  In particular we have been remiss in failing to share the greatest performance of a modern Holiday song ever.  Period. No arguments.  The crown goes to Judy Garland singing Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas to Margaret O’Brien in the 1944 film classic Meet Me in St. Louis.

This year amid the separations and loneliness caused by the Coronavirus pandemic the throat catching melancholy of Garland’s performance is more resonate than ever.

In some ways the role of the second daughter Esther of the comfortably middle class St. Louis Smith family was a step back for Garland to the juvenile parts in which she had gained she had gained fame.  She had finally broken throughto be cast as a young woman in Presenting Lilly Mars.  But here she was back to playing a love struck high school girl.

On the other hand producer Arthur Freedwas planning to biggest MGM musical to date in Technicolor and directed by studio ace Vincent Minelli.  In addition to Garland and O’Brien—the most popular child star since Shirley Temple—the cast included Mary Astor as Mother, Leon Ames at Father, Louise Bremmer as older sister Rose, and Tom Drake as the boy next door.  It also featured solid support by veteran character actors Henry Davenport, Marjorie Main, and Chill Wills.

The film was adapted from auto-biographical short stories by Sally Benson originally published in The New Yorker.  It was divided into a series of seasonal vignettes, starting with summer 1903 of a year in the life of the Smith family in St. Louis, leading up to the opening of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition—the St. Louis World’s fair in the spring of 1904.

Journeyman songwriters Hugh Martin and Ralph Blane were commissioned to write songs for the film, although other composers were also expected to add numbers including Boys and Girls Like You and Me by Rodgers & Hammersteinoriginal written for their Broadway musical Oklahoma! but cut prior to its opening.   The same fate befell the song when Minnelli reluctantly cutit because the film was running long.  Martin and Blane’s contributions became American classics and standards—The Trolley Song, The Boy Next Door and of course the Christmas song all sung by Garland.

Judy Garland herself intervened to demand important changes to the lyric of Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.  Martin’s original lyrics began, “Have yourself a merry little Christmas / It may be your last / Next year we may all be living in the past.”  She recognized that it was way too depressing to sing to the inconsolable child mourning the imminent departure of the family from St. Louis to New York City.  “I’ll look like a sadist,” Garland complained.  The words were changed to the now familiar “Have yourself a merry little Christmas/Let your heart be light/From now on your troubles will be out of sight.”

A performer herself since the age of 3 and understanding the pressure that stage parents and the studio put children through, Garland formed a special protective bondwith young Margaret O’Brien and spent much of her time off camera with the girl.  It was a memory they would both treasure and often talk about.

Garland never looked lovelier than she did in this film with her hair dyed auburn and smitten director Minnelli literally caressed her face on screen.  The young actress and the middle age director fell in love on the set and were soon married.

Many other versions of the song have been recorded.  Frank Sinatra had lyricist Martin revise the words to “lighten them up” from the still melancholy version sung by Garland for his 1957 album A Jolly Christmas.  The only version to come near to the power of Garland’s performance was by The Carpenters from the 1978 album Christmas Portrait.  Karen Carpenter in The Carpenters the 1978 album Christmas Portrait nearly—but not quite—matchedthe original.

It was inevitable.  Coronavirus Christmas songs and parodies I mean.  I easily found a dozen on YouTube and there were many more, mostly homemade and amateur.  Celebs and semi-celebs posted professional videos featuring original songs—Justin Bieber and a choir made up of British National Health Service workerscollaborated on a charity song and video a remix of the star’s single Holy, Covid Christmas by rapper Trisha Paytas, and Disinfects the Halls by mid-level country star Chris Stapleton off of a whole album of pandemicChristmas music.  But parodies by YouTube stars dominate.

It is quite fitting that The Twelve Days of Christmas, the holiday song once voted the “most annoying,” was satirized by several performers each with their own take.  I understand why a lot of folks were irked by the original, but my personal listof annoying and/or detestable holiday songs include Dominick the Donkey, Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer, and is capped by the loathsome Christmas Shoes.  Be that as it may, The Twelve Days of Christmas is long and repetitive, just like days of Covid-19 isolation.

From several possible candidates I plucked one by a duo called Jon + Jon about who may be affiliated with the New Life Church in Eugene, Oregon.   I otherwise know nothing about them, but here is their take, Twelve Days of Christmas Covid Edition.

The silken voice of jazz and pop chanteuse Nancy Wilson was stilled two years ago in the Christmas season when she died at age 81 after a long illness at her Pioneertown, California.  Although often identified as a jazz artist, she preferred to characterize herself as a song interpreter for the way she caressed lyrics, she said, “I do not do runs and—you know. I take a lyric and make it mine. I consider myself an interpreter of the lyric.”

Wilson was born on February 20, 1939 in Chillicothe, Ohio to working class parents who filled their home with recording by Billy Eckstine, Nat King Cole, Jimmy Scottwith Lionel Hampton’s Big Band, and especially Dinah Washington.  At an early age she was singing their songs around the house and was also featured in her church choir.  She said she knew she would be a singer by age 12.

The family moved to Columbus, Ohio where at the age of 15 and still in high school she won a talent contest.  The prizewas an appearance on Skyline Melodies, a twice-a-week local TV show on WTVN. She so impressed the station that she was soon made the regular host of the program.  Until graduating from high school two years later she regularly performed in local clubs.

Her parents were leery of the chances for a successful career as a singer, so she enrolled in Central State College, a historically Black school to prepare to be a teacher.  That did not last long.  She dropped out to pursue her dreams.  Wilson won a spot with Rusty Bryant’s Carolyn Club Big Band in 1956 and toured with them throughout Canada and the Midwest for two years.  She made her first recordings with the band on Dot Records.

Her big break came when she met saxophonist and jazz superstar Cannonball Adderley who became her mentor and eventually collaborator.  He encouraged her to abandon touring with the band and to move to New York Citywhere there was opportunity for a singer of her talent.  Within weeks she secured a regular four-night-a-week gig at the popular night club The Blue Morocco.  Adderley’s manager John Levy hooked her up with Capital Records which released her first solo single Guess Who I Saw Todaywhich was so successful that Capital released five of her albums from 1960 to 62 beginning with Like in Love showcasing a Rhythm & Blues style.  The collaboration Nancy Wilson and Cannonball Adderley cemented her reputation as a jazz singer. 

By the mid-60’s Wilson was a star in her own right.  1964 she released what became her biggest hit on the Billboard Hot 100, (You Don't Know) How Glad I Am, which peaked at No. 11.  From 1963 to 1971 Wilson logged eleven songs on the Hot 100, including two Christmas singles.

Wilson was featured on all of the top variety shows including the Ed Sullivan Show, the Smothers Brothers Comedy Show, and Carol Burnett as well as on talk shows from the Tonight Show with both Jack Paar and Johnny Carson, to Mike Douglas, and Arsenio Hall.  She had her own series on NBC, The Nancy Wilson Show in the 1967–1968 season—a stunning breakthrough for a Black female artist—for which she won an Emmy.

Her good looks and statuesque figure led to acting.  At first appearing as herself or fictional singers on programs like I Spy and The FBI she was soon doing dramatic guest spots on several series including Room 222, Hawaii Five-O, and Police Story.  More recently she had recurring roles on Moesha, and The Parkers.

Despite a booming career in the ‘60’s and ‘70’s and warning that it would kill her career with white audiences, Wilson found time to be an active supporter of and participant in the Civil Rights Movement including participation in the Selma to Montgomery March for voting rights.  In recognition of that work she was won the Urban Leagues Whitney Young Award, and NAACP Image Award, was honored by the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change, and was inducted into the International Civil Rights Walk of Fame at the Martin Luther King Jr. National Historic Site of which she said, “This award means more to me than anything else I have ever received.”

Although her days of hit singles were over by the mid-70’s Wilson continued to record critically praised albums for decades.  She won two of her three Grammy Awards—the first was in 1965 for Best R&B Recording for How Glad I Am—for jazz albums late in her career, R.S.V.P. (Rare Songs, Very Personal) in 2005 and Turned to Blue in 2007, both on the MCG Jazz label.

Wilson reaped many more honors and continued to record, tour, and act until ill health forced her to retire from touring 2008.  She made a final public appearance on September 10, 2011, at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio where she noted “I’m not going to be doing it anymore, and what better place to end it than where I started—in Ohio.”

In 2001 Wilson released A Nancy Wilson Christmas with all proceeds benefiting the Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild, a Pittsburg non-profit that promotes music and the arts to poor and minority children.  That fine LP, did not, however, include her wonderful 1969 cover of The Christmas Waltz originally written by Sammy Cahn and Jule Stynefor Frank Sinatra in 1954.  No one has ever done that lovely song better.

Today is the Third Sunday in Advent and past time to share a true Advent Carol.  As you might recall churches that honor the liturgical calendar traditionally did not sing Christmas hymns and carols until Christmas Eve and continued singing them until the Feast of the Epiphany.  The Advent season had its own songs, the best known of which is O Come O Come Emanuel.  In practice many American churches blur the distinction these days.

Each Christian denomination has its own selection of Advent carols in their hymnals, some widely shared with others, some unique and tailored to the sect’s particular Christology or theology.