Published on 12, July, 2020
With Christmas rapidly approaching - it seems only twelve months since last time - I thought I would start a thread on Christmas - what it means to us, our memories, what traditions we have (locally or of our own), what we like or don't like, and also to share our favourite films and music of Christmas.
I do not like the commerciality of Christmas. My favourite memories of Christmas were when I was young, and returning from Church before Christmas to the glow of the the wireless/gramophone set in the living room, the light of which was an eerie green colour, the room being lit by the lights of the Christmas tree and a collection of 78's of Christmas Carols playing on the gramophone. It was a truly magical time.
In the late 1980's a programme was made for Channel 4 of Dylan Thomas's 'A Child's Christmas in Wales'. This is a film I watch over and over again, it just evokes memories of my early Christmases, when we did not have a television set. This film isW beautifully shot, and brings the humour of Dylan Thomas out. 'A Child's Christmas in Wales' was originally a short story, and there are versions of Dylan Thomas himself reading it on You Tube. Dylan Thomas had such a beautiful way of putting things into words, and perhaps because of my own Welsh heritage it always brings a bit of a tear to my eye, in a good way!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BTSQYdBuZY
I also think humour is an important part of Christmas and the Christmas season. I like all sorts of Christmas music from religious to secular, and songs which are really about the season rather than Christmas. So for my first song which I will put here is this one from Bob Rivers (who is a record producer, not the singer!), the song is a parody of a delivery by a certain brother and sister who were very popular in the 1970's
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GONd04tiLk
Please share what Christmas means to you here. And I will add more as the days pass!
A lot of Christmas songs I find totally cringe-worthy. I enjoy the traditional 'folk' Christmas songs such as 'All Hail to the Days' (or as known alternatively as 'To drive the cold winter away', and some of the standard carols. However, the vitality of these is sometimes lost in the way they are arranged and the tunes they are sung to. They seem to lose their vibrancy, their vigour, their joyfulness a lot of times.
An example of this is 'While Shepherds Watched their Flocks by night'. The song these days is normally sung to 'Winchester Old' a tune which I find dreary. However, there are many other tunes to which the song is sung (over 200). One of the tunes used, Cranbrook, was parodied by a group of choirboys while travelling across Ilkley Moor in Yorkshire, who sang different words to the tune. The tune Cranbrook these days is better known as the tune for 'On Ilkley Moor bah't tat). The verse form of 'While Shepherds Watched' means that many tunes can be set to the words. Try singing it to 'Pinball Wizard', it sounds brilliant!
Some time ago, Bob Rivers produced a recording of 'Oh Little town of Bethlehem'. The tune usually used for this (in Britain at least) is a variation of the folk tune 'The Ploughboys dream'. However, this recording uses the tune of a popular song of the nineteen sixties and works so very well. So here it is, listen and enjoy:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Cbk8f7f5OI
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And Bob Rivers has done so many parodies that there are too many to list here really. However, some of my other favourites are:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xj-jGAJgZY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2yqYa2advT0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1jOtOahm54