Let it snow

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Instrumental version for guitar and cello

The snow trickles softly is one of the most famous Christmas carols in German. It was composed by the evangelical pastor Eduard Ebel (1839-1905) in Graudenz in 1895 and published under the title Christmas greeting in his volume Gesammelte Gedichte . The composition of the melody is also often attributed to Ebel, but this statement is uncertain and apparently unproven, especially since Ebel's own publication only contains the text. According to other sources, the melody is a folk tune that Ebel may have adopted for his song himself. According to other information, the melody is said to have been based on a musette (1792) by Daniel Gottlob Türk (1750–1813); the similarity of the melodies only affects the first bar and a half .

melody

\ relative c '' {\ key g \ major \ time 6/8 \ autoBeamOff b4 b8 aba | g4. ~ g4 r8 g4 e8 g fis e | d4. ~ d4 r8 a'8 gis acba | g4. ~ g4 r8 a8. e16 e8 f sharp e f sharp | g4. ~ g4 r8 \ bar "|." } \ addlyrics {Lei - se rie - selt the | Snow, still and rigid lies the | Lake, Christmas - night - the | shines Wald: Rejoice, Christian child is coming soon. }

text

Text of the Christmas greeting in Eduard Ebel's Collected Poems (1895)

“The snow trickles softly,
the lake lies still and rigid,
the forest shines like Christmas:
Rejoice, the Christ Child is coming soon.

The hearts are warm,
grief and harm are silent,
worry of life fades away:
Rejoice, the Christ Child is coming soon.

Soon it will be holy night;
Choir of angels awakens;
Just hear how lovely it sounds:
Rejoice, the Christ Child is coming soon. "

background

Eduard Ebel himself originally described his poem simply as “a children's song ”. It is not a hymn of proclamation or faith that has a liturgical place in the Advent season , but it preserves the reverence for the consecration of the " holy night " and is characterized by the pronounced expectation of the coming of the Christ Child as a song for the pre-Christmas season. The folklorist Ingeborg Weber-Kellermann counts the song among the “more or less banal potpourri songs”. It is one of the most famous Christmas nursery rhymes.

reception

The song has been used repeatedly as a template for derisive parodies . This is how school children sang in the 1980s:

The four
falls softly on the certificate paper.
Just listen to how lovely it sounds
when my father slams me a few!

The cabaret artist Dieter Süverkrüp wrote another parody in 1969 . There is also a parody from the GDR from 1988 that deals with a possible accident at the Stendal nuclear power plant (which was not in operation) .

Web links

Commons : The snow is falling quietly  - a collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Christmas greeting  - sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Eduard Ebel: Collected poems. Gaebel, o. O. [Graudenz] 1895, p. 86 ( scans on Wikimedia Commons ).
  2. ↑ a b Theo Mang, Sunhilt Mang (ed.): Der Liederquell . Noetzel, Wilhelmshaven 2007, ISBN 978-3-7959-0850-8 , pp. 1005-1006 .
  3. ^ Walter Hansen: Advent and Christmas carols. Mosaik, Munich 1979, ISBN 3-570-07253-3 , p. 74.
  4. ↑ Christa Holtei, Tilman Michalski: The large family book of Christmas carols. Sauerländer, Düsseldorf 2008, ISBN 978-3-7941-7629-8 , p. 36 f.
  5. ↑ Roland Burmeister: The music passages at Arno Schmidt: chronological list of positions for the complete works of Arno Schmidt with explanations and comments. Häusser, Darmstadt 1991, ISBN 3-927902-57-8 , p. 623 ( limited preview in the Google book search)
  6. ↑ Daniel Gottlob Türk: No. 37: Musette. In: 120 handpieces for aspiring piano players, first part, p. 16 : Notes and audio files in the International Music Score Library Project
  7. ↑ Friedrich Haarhaus (Ed.): Power up the door. The most beautiful Advent songs. Benno, Leipzig 2012, ISBN 978-3-7462-3491-5 , p. 18 f.
  8. ↑ a b Ingeborg Weber-Kellermann : The book of Christmas carols. B. Schott's Sons, Mainz 1982, ISBN 3-7957-2061-3 , p. 195.
  9. ↑ First in: Uwe Wandrey (Ed.): Silent night all around! A nasty variety. Rowohlt Taschenbuch Verlag, Reinbek bei Hamburg 1972, ISBN 3-499-11561-1 , p. 113 f. Printed in: Udohaben (ed.): Süverkrüps Liederjahre 1963–1985 ff. Grupello, Düsseldorf 2002, ISBN 3-933749-88-3 , p. 148 f.
  10. ↑ Ralf Mattern: Forbidden Songs! Lost songs? Texts from the GDR 1984–1989. BoD - Books on Demand, 2001, ISBN 3-8311-2576-7 , p. 84 ( limited preview in Google book search).