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Yes, it gets cold in Indiana when Christmas comes near. But snow--
the hoped-for ingredient to make it a "White Christmas"--is not
guaranteed. Nor is it in most parts of the country and the world.
And yet, we often hear "if there is no snow, it doesn't look or
feel like Christmas." Our Christmas image, shaped by the central
and northern European reception of the Nativity of Christ--on
December 24--simply calls for cold and snow.
The villagers of Oberndorf, when they first sang "Silent Night,"
written by their Vicar Joseph Mohr, with music and accompaniment by
the village teacher and organist, Franz Xaver Gruber, surely must
have had snow knee deep, as it is usually the case in the Alpine
regions. When we envision or see on television the story and the
setting of "Silent Night," Oberndorf near Salzburg, Austria, we see
the little country church, buried in snow, with the mountains as a
backdrop.
And Clement C. Moore and Thomas Nast, the artistic mentors of
Santa Claus, have him coming in a sleigh--from the cold and snowy
region of the North Pole, through a "Winter Wonderland" with "Jingle
Bells" announcing his arrival, while millions are "Dreaming of a White
Christmas."
The following is the description of the genesis of "Silent Night,"
taken from the Austria Media Bulletin 9&10 of 1993.
175 YEARS "SILENT NIGHT, HOLY NIGHT" - "STILLE NACHT, HEILIGE NACHT"
26-year old Joseph Mohr, assistant to the priest at St.
Nicholas' Church at Oberndorf, a village on the Salzach River 11 miles
down river from the city of Salzburg, was worried in the days before
Christmas 1818; the old church organ was out of commission once more.
It would be Spring before the itinerant organ repairman would come by
to fix the instrument. The implication was almost unthinkable: Mass
on Christmas Eve without music. Mohr had a poem he had written, a
moving expression of faith putting the miracle of Christmas, the
coming of the Lord into this world as a human, a newborn child,
into words the simple folk could understand. He approached his
friend, 31-year-old Franz X. Gruber, a school teacher in the
neighboring village of Arnsdorf and organist at St. Nicholas',
shared the poem with him and asked him to set it to music so that
they could sing it together, to guitar accompaniment at the midnight
service celebrating the birth of Christ.
Thus, on Christmas Eve, December 24, 1818, a song was created,
a carol composed, that was to become the most universal of all songs,
sung all over the globe in every language known to mankind. And yet,
It was only by coincidence that "Silent Night, Holy Night" came down
to us at all. After the premiere, the song was quickly forgotten;
if Carl Mauracher had not been commissioned to rebuild the organ at St. Nicholas' in 1825, found a handwritten copy of the words
and musical notation during his work in the organ loft and taken
it along to his native Ziller Valley in the mountains of Tyrol,
the song might have remained ephemeral. Mohr was transferred
away from Oberndorf in 1819, his ties with F. X. Gruber became
tenuous. Mauracher's home, the Ziller Valley, has always had
a very strong musical tradition, used to be the home of folk
choirs such as the Strasser and Rainer families that traveled
and performed all over Europe for the edification of noblemen
and wealthy patricians. Choral groups from this Tyrolian valley
spread "Silent Night, Holy Night" wherever they went, making it
known as "the Tyrolian folk carol."
Had it not been for the curiosity of the director of the Royal
Court Choir of Berlin, where "Silent Night" had become the favorite
of King Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia, who researched the origins
of the carol and traced it to Salzburg in 1854, we might never have
learned of Joseph Mohr, Franz X. Gruber and the circumstances which
brought about the creation of the world's best-loved Christmas carol
175 years ago.
| STILLE NACHT, HEILIGE NACHT | SILENT NIGHT, HOLY NIGHT |
|
Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht, Alles schläft, einsam wacht Nur das traute, hochheilige Paar, Holder Knabe im lockigen Haar Schlaf in himmlischer Ruh'! Schlaf in himmlischer Ruh'!
Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht,
Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht,
Three further stanzas of the German text. |
Silent night, Holy night, All is calm, all is bright, 'Round yon Virgin Mother and Child Holy Infant so tender and mild, Sleep in heavenly peace, Sleep in heavenly peace.
Silent night, Holy night,
Silent night, Holy night, |
OTHER RESOURCES compiled by Robert Shea
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