Christmas Carols: the Short List

Some of our families are going Christmas Caroling after Evensong tomorrow evening. There used to be songsheets somewhere, but with M.W.'s retirement, they seem to have disappeared.

Thus, I cheerfully volunteered to “print something up.”

How long can it take? Ten minutes, maximum. I will look through the Christmas section of the Hymnal 1982, go to the Episcopal software “RiteSong,” and export the text files for a selection of carols.

The Christmas section runs from 77 to 115, thirty-eight selections. And that is omitting such hangers-on as “O come, O come Emmanuel” (Advent) and “We three kings” (Epiphany). No space for such things: we are going Christmas Caroling, not Advent Caroling. Even though it is in the middle of Advent. Many of these songs are unknown to our congregation; some of the others can be omitted with no shedding of tears.

I have sixteen songs, which in full text runs nine pages. I put them into two columns: it is still five pages. I start trimming stanzas – we don't really need six stanzas of “O come, all ye faithful” for our purposes; two or three stanzas at most will suffice. That is hard with the ones that tell a story, such as “The First Nowell.”

Four pages. And I do not want it to exceed one sheet, front and back. I remove the title, “Christmas Carols.” They can figure out what the sheet is without a title. Neither do I title the songs; I put the first line in 16-point and boldface; that will suffice. But it is still three and a half pages.

Now it becomes hard.

“Angels we have heard on high” is loads of fun. But it is a little light on substance. Delete.

“While shepherds watched their flocks by night” is in my opinion essential for Episcopalians. It was included with Tate and Brady; it was bound into the old Prayerbooks. With difficulty, I hit Delete.

I would happily delete “Go tell it on the mountain,” but for reasons peculiar to our parish, I cannot. They would lynch me. Nonetheless, I trim it to one stanza and the refrain.

I love “God rest ye merry, gentlemen.” But it has to go. It is either that or “Good Christian men friends rejoice.” I keep the latter.

So close... all I need to do is find room for two stanzas of “Silent Night” that are bleeding over to page three. They really would lynch me if I left that one out.

I chop one more stanza from “The First Nowell.” Three more lines of text and we've got it.

Time to finagle the layout. I try reducing the font size to 12 point. But it is going to be unreadable under Caroling Conditions; back to 14 point. I reduce the side margins: Bingo!!!! That does it! “Silent Night” now falls nicely into the last page, all three stanzas of it. The page turn even works: the front side finishes with “Go tell it on the mountain” (groan!), the back side begins with “Joy to the world” (hooray!)

Total editing time: 36 minutes.

Here is my list of Ten Essential Christmas Carols:

O little town of Bethlehem
O come, all ye faithful
Hark! The herald angels sing
Angels we have heard on high
Go tell it on the mountain
Joy to the world
Away in a manger
Good Christian friends rejoice
The first Nowell
Silent night