What inspired those popular carols?

It was St. Augustine who described a hymn as a “Song with Praise of God”. A hymn is also described as a means of raising or quickening the spirit of devotion and helps to confirm one’s faith, hope, and love to God and man.

The stories behind the writing of the carols and hymns we sing at Christmas are interesting, specially as they have been inspired by personal feelings.

Many of us will join on Christmas day in singing “Christians awake, Salute the happy morn”. The Christian church owes this magnificent hymn to the wish of a pretty young girl, Dolly Byron and her father who lived in Manchester more than 200 years ago (1691-1763). John Byron was a teacher of shorthand and had asked his eight-year-old daughter what she would like for a Christmas present. Dolly, knowing that her father sometimes wrote poetry replied, “Please write me a poem".

When she came down on Christmas morning, she found on her plate a piece of paper with this beautiful hymn. Soon after John Wainwright, the organist of Manchester parish church, saw the hymn, and composed for it the tune “Yorkshire".

The simple Austrian village hymn known in English as “Silent Night, Holy Night” is heard around the world on every Christmas in more than fifty languages. Josef Mohr, the priest in charge of St. Nicolai church is the writer of this much loved carol. On the Christmas eve of 1818, Rev. Father Josef handed over a poem to his organist Franz Xaver Gruber and wanted him to compose a melody for two solo voices with guitar accompaniment. On that same Dec. 24, Gruber produced the carol whose serenity fills Christian souls.

It is interesting to note that Rev. Mohr whose father was a soldier wanted his son to join the Austrian Army. Gruber who was from a poor family had secretly learned to play the organ against his father’s wishes in just three months at the age of 18. How wonderful is the hand of God that within three months a young boy was chosen to compose one of the most absorbing melodies of all time.

The well known carol “Hark the Herald” is considered one of the best from Charles Wesley’s pen.

He had been listening to the wonderful Christmas messages of his brother, John, George Whitefield, and Martin Madan. The depth of the spiritual messages and the soul-stirring experiences of these sermons inspired Charles to write this magnificent hymn which was sung at the Royal Palace as well as on the streets. It has been said that Queen Victoria who was very interested in classical music and hymns loved this carol especially for its music and spiritual value and wanted it at every Christmas service.
May these hymn stories help us to experience our Saviour’s love and concern towards mankind.