Author: David

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtQr81k3TSk

And

[audio:Midnight_Clear_clip.mp3]

The Gift

Trees and lights and bells and carols;
Bright-wrapped packages, piled high;
Winter’s sharp blow joins the heralds:
“Christmas-time is nigh!”

Mailmen hurry; shoppers scurry;
Time is fleeing – Oh! So fast!
Parties gather, loud and merry,
Grander than in Christmas’ past.

Pause a moment to remember
That a Savior’s simple birth
Still stirs angel wings in susur’ –
“Peace to men; good will on earth!”

Now the Father’s hands that molded
The first Adam in the clay,
Gently ’round a manger folded,
Cradle a Baby in the hay.

So the Greatest Gift extended,
Gift of love and peace to all,
“God’s great love to man descended”
Calls us to a manger stall.

©1990 David Needham

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7pJFG-fRWk

[audio:http://thirdworldcounty.us/audio/John_Rutter_Candlelight_Carol.mp3]

(Once again, semi-sincere *heh* apology for the rough embedding; you’ll need a media player plugin to view/listen)

Deleted the video I’d embedded and converted it to an mp3. Wait for it. There’s an almost 8-second lag before it starts that I didn’t edit out.

Slightly “less good” musically (the first performance is helped by having the composer conduct *heh* For one thing, Rutter just happened to get the tempos right ;-)), but an cleaner embedding of a video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eME_gxZRDxo

I like John Rutter’s music. There. I’ve admitted it. 😉 (Apologies for the sloppy embedding, but the YouTube uploader of the piece disabled embedding the YT video and I’m too lazy to put a lot of effort into embedding it slickly. The music’s the same, in any case.)

Oh, heck, here’s a version from Slovenia while I’m at it:

And another performance by a younger choir than either of the two above (and, really, better despite a few pitch problems–more forgivable in such a young group–and their director? For the cognoscenti, two words: Elizabeth Green *heh*):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1eLDvM7eSq0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlbJToqI3nU

And in English by a very different group:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaUHHz8Y9Qw