If there’s one thing, Christmas is well known for its the sound of carols playing from speakers everywhere you look.
Infectious sounds with catching rhymes, Christmas carols have grown with us from childhood into adulthood. What’s more exciting about them is the untold secrets behind these carols that no one talks about.
In fact, many iconic Christmas carols have fascinating and surprising origin stories. Here are some untold secrets behind your favorite timeless Christmas carols you probably didn’t know:
- Silent Night
A well-known Christmas carol, Silent Night, has been attributed to many famous composers, including Haydn and Beethoven. It was not until 1995 when the song’s original 1820 manuscript was found confirming the song’s composers.
Silent Night was written by two Austrians: Franz Xaver Gruber, a primary school teacher, Joseph Mohr, an assistant pastor at St. Nicholas Church in Salzburg. Gruber had started working as a choirmaster and organist at the church in 1816 when he composed Stille Nacht alongside Mohr.
Mohr wrote the lyrics while Gruber composed the music. Silent Night was performed for the first time at Christmas Mass in 1818, with Gruber on the organ and Mohr on guitar. The carol became mini-popular when an organ builder who serviced the church’s organ fell in love with the song and spread the news to other churches.
It was later picked up by two popular traveling families of folk singers around 1931, the Strassers and the Rainers, after which it grew in popularity.
- Jingle Bells
Another really popular Christmas carol, Jingle Bells, was composed by organist James Pierpont at a Unitarian church in Savannah, Georgia, as a thanksgiving tune. In 1857, Pierpont copyrighted the song “One Horse Open Sleigh.”
