Songs For Christmas
   HOME
*





Songs For Christmas
''Songs for Christmas'' (stylized as ''Sufjan Stevens Presents Songs for Christmas'' on the cover) is a box set of five separate EPs of Christmas-related songs and carols recorded by independent musician Sufjan Stevens between 2001 and 2006. The EPs had been given as gifts to friends and family of Stevens over the past six years, except for 2004 when he was too busy recording the ''Illinois'' album. Though the first three EPs had already been available on Sufjan Stevens-related fansites for several years, ''Songs for Christmas'' is the first official release of these EPs. Most of the tracks are versions of traditional Christmas songs, with a number of original compositions such as "Sister Winter" and "Star of Wonder". Sufjan Stevens has developed a reputation for being a devoted Christian and many of the songs he chose for inclusion on ''Songs for Christmas'' are religious in nature, including his original compositions. The box set includes a poster of Sufjan Stevens, an animated ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Sufjan Stevens
Sufjan Stevens ( ; born July 1, 1975) is an American singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. He has released nine solo studio albums and multiple collaborative albums with other artists. Stevens has received Grammy and Academy Award nominations. His debut album, '' A Sun Came'', was released in 2000 on the Asthmatic Kitty label, which he co-founded with his stepfather. He received wide recognition for his 2005 album ''Illinois'', which hit number one on the ''Billboard'' Top Heatseekers chart, and for the single "Chicago" from that album. Stevens later contributed to the soundtrack of the 2017 film ''Call Me by Your Name''. He received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song and a Grammy nomination for Best Song Written for Visual Media for the soundtrack's lead single, " Mystery of Love." Stevens has released albums of varying styles, from the electronica of '' The Age of Adz'' and the lo-fi folk of ''Seven Swans'' to the symphonic instrumentation of ''Ill ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Franz X
Franz may refer to: People * Franz (given name) * Franz (surname) Places * Franz (crater), a lunar crater * Franz, Ontario, a railway junction and unorganized town in Canada * Franz Lake, in the state of Washington, United States – see Franz Lake National Wildlife Refuge Businesses * Franz Deuticke, a scientific publishing company based in Vienna, Austria * Franz Family Bakeries, a food processing company in Portland, Oregon * Franz-porcelains, a Taiwanese brand of pottery based in San Francisco Other uses * ''Franz'' (film), a 1971 Belgian film * Franz Lisp, a dialect of the Lisp programming language See also * Frantz (other) * Franzen (other) * Frantzen (other) Frantzen or Frantzén is a surname. It may refer to: * Allen Frantzen (born 1947/48), American medievalist * Björn Frantzén (born 1977), Swedish chef and owner of the Frantzén restaurant * Jean-Pierre Frantzen (1890–1957), Luxembourgian gym ...
{{disambiguation ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Bring A Torch, Jeanette, Isabella
"Bring a Torch, Jeanette, Isabella" (french: Un flambeau, Jeannette, Isabelle) is a Christmas carol which originated from the Provence region of France in the 17th century. The song is usually notated in 3/8 time. The carol was first published in France, and was subsequently translated into English in the 18th century. The song was originally not meant for Christmas; it was considered dance music for French nobility. History The carol first appeared in print in 1688 with the Provençal text ''Venès lèu, Vèire la piéucello; Venès lèu, Genti pastourèu!'' in a collection of twelve Provençal '' noëls'' by Nicolas Saboly. The popularity of the melody is attested by its use four years later by Marc-Antoine Charpentier for the drinking song, ''Qu'ils sont doux, bouteille jolie'' in a 1672 revival of Molière's ''Le médecin malgré lui''. To this day on Christmas Eve in Provence, children dress as shepherds and milkmaids, bringing torches and candles while singing the carol o ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Greensleeves
"Greensleeves" is a traditional English folk song. A broadside ballad by the name "A Newe Northen Dittye of ye Ladye Greene Sleves" was registered by Richard Jones at the London Stationer's Company in September 1580,Frank Kidson, ''English Folk-Song and Dance''. READ BOOKS, 2008, p.26. John M. Ward, "'And Who But Ladie Greensleeues?'", in ''The Well Enchanting Skill: Music, Poetry, and Drama in the Culture of the Renaissance: Essays in Honour of F. W. Sternfeld'', edited by John Caldwell, Edward Olleson, and Susan Wollenberg, 181–211 (Oxford:Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 1990): 181. . and the tune is found in several late-16th-century and early-17th-century sources, such as ''Ballet's MS Lute Book'' and ''Het Luitboek van Thysius'', as well as various manuscripts preserved in the Seeley Historical Library in the University of Cambridge. Form "Greensleeves" can have a ground either of the form called a ''romanesca''; or its slight variant, the ''passame ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

William Chatterton Dix
William Chatterton Dix (14 June 1837 – 9 September 1898) was an English writer of hymns and carols. He was born in Bristol, the son of John Dix, a local surgeon, who wrote ''The Life of Chatterton'' the poet, a book of ''Pen Pictures of Popular English Preachers'' and other works.James Moffatt, ''Handbook to the Church Hymnary'', Oxford University Press, 1927 His father gave him his middle name in honour of Thomas Chatterton, a poet about whom he had written a biography. He was educated at the Grammar School, Bristol, for a mercantile career, and became manager of a maritime insurance company in Glasgow where he spent most of his life.James Moffatt, ''Handbook to the Church Hymnary'', Oxford University Press, 1927, p. 318 His original hymns are found in most modern hymn-books. He wrote also felicitous renderings in metrical form of Richard Frederick Littledale's translations from the Greek in his ''Offices of the Holy Eastern Church''; and of Rodwell's translations of Abyssin ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




What Child Is This
"What Child Is This?" is a Christmas carol with lyrics written by William Chatterton Dix in 1865 and set to the tune of "Greensleeves", a traditional English folk song, in 1871. Although written in Great Britain, the carol today is more popular in the United States than its country of origin. Lyrics Composition The first verse poses a rhetorical question in the first half, with the response coming in the second half. The second verse contains another question that is answered, while the final verse is a universal appeal to everyone urging them "to accept Christ". The carol's melody has been described as "soulful", "haunting and beautiful" in nature. Context The context of the carol centres around the Adoration of the Shepherds who visit during the Nativity of Jesus. The questions posed in the lyrics reflect what the shepherds were possibly pondering to themselves when they encountered Jesus, with the rest of the carol providing a response to their questions. Background ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Hark! The Herald Angels Sing!
"Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" is an English Christmas carol that first appeared in 1739 in the collection ''Hymns and Sacred Poems''. The carol, based on , tells of an angelic chorus singing praises to God. As it is known in the modern era, it features lyrical contributions from Charles Wesley and George Whitefield, two of the founding ministers of Methodism, with music adapted from " Vaterland, in deinen Gauen" by Felix Mendelssohn. Wesley, who had written the original version as "Hymn for Christmas-Day," had requested and received slow and solemn music for his lyrics, which has since largely been discarded. In 1840—a hundred years after the publication of ''Hymns and Sacred Poems''—Mendelssohn composed a cantata to commemorate Johann Gutenberg's invention of movable type printing, and it is music from this cantata, adapted by the English musician William H. Cummings to fit the lyrics of "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing", that propels the carol known today.
[...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Once In Royal David's City
Once in Royal David's City is a Christmas carol originally written as a poem by Cecil Frances Alexander. The carol was first published in 1848 in her hymnbook ''Hymns for Little Children''. A year later, the English organist Henry Gauntlett discovered the poem and set it to music. History ''Hymns for Little Children'' was a collection of poems aimed to elucidate parts of the Apostles' Creed for use in Sunday schools or in the home; "Once in Royal David's City" told the story of the nativity of Jesus to illuminate "born of the Virgin Mary". Other well-known hymns in the collection included "All Things Bright and Beautiful" (on the subject of "Genesis creation narrative, maker of Heaven and Earth") and "There is a green hill far away" (on "Crucifixion of Jesus, Was crucified dead and buried"). Alexander was married to the Anglicanism, Anglican clergyman William Alexander (bishop), William Alexander, who was Archbishop of Armagh (Church of Ireland), Archbishop of Armagh, and her m ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

I Saw Three Ships
"I Saw Three Ships (Come Sailing In)" is an English Christmas carol, listed as number 700 in the Roud Folk Song Index. The earliest printed version of "I Saw Three Ships" is from the 17th century, possibly Derbyshire, and was also published by William Sandys in 1833. The song was probably traditionally known as "As I Sat On a Sunny Bank", and was particularly popular in Cornwall. Lyrics The modern lyrics are from an 1833 version by the English lawyer and antiquarian William Sandys, and consist of nine verses. The lyrics mention the ships sailing into Bethlehem, but the nearest body of water is the Dead Sea about away. The reference to three ships is thought to originate in the three ships that bore the purported relics of the Biblical magi to Cologne Cathedral in the 12th century. Another possible reference is to Wenceslaus II, King of Bohemia, who bore a coat of arms "Azure three galleys argent". Another suggestion is that the ships are actually the camels used by the M ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Come Thou Fount Of Every Blessing
"Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing" is a Christian hymn written by the pastor and hymnodist Robert Robinson, who penned the words in the year 1758 at the age of 22. Tunes In the United States, the hymn is usually set to an American folk tune known as "Nettleton", which first appears in ''Wyeth's Repository of Sacred Music, Part Second'' (1813), possibly collected by Elkanah Kelsey Dare, who was the musical editor (John Wyeth himself was a printer). The tune appears on page 112 in F major for two voices (tenor and bass), with a revival chorus (Hallelujah, Hallelujah, we are on our journey home); the facing page has another musical setting ("Concert") in A minor without any chorus. Asahel Nettleton also published music, so some attribute his namesake tune directly to him. In the United Kingdom, the hymn is also often set to the tune "Normandy" by C Bost. The "Nettleton" tune is used extensively in partial or full quotation by the American composer Charles Ives, in such work ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Angels We Have Heard On High
"Angels We Have Heard on High" is a Christmas carol to the hymn tune "Gloria" from a traditional French song of unknown origin called "", with paraphrased English lyrics by James Chadwick. The song's subject is the birth of Jesus Christ as narrated in the Gospel of Luke, specifically the scene outside Bethlehem in which shepherds encounter a multitude of angels singing and praising the newborn child. Tune "Angels We Have Heard on High" is generally sung to the hymn tune "Gloria", a traditional French carol as arranged by Edward Shippen Barnes. Its most memorable feature is its chorus, " Gloria in excelsis Deo", where the "o" of "Gloria" is fluidly sustained through 16 notes of a rising and falling melismatic melodic sequence. In England, the words of James Montgomery's "Angels from the Realms of Glory" are usually sung to this tune, with the "Gloria in excelsis Deo" refrain text replacing Montgomery's. It is from this usage that the tune sometimes is known as "Iris", the na ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Amazing Grace
"Amazing Grace" is a Christian hymn published in 1779 with words written in 1772 by English Anglican clergyman and poet John Newton (1725–1807). It is an immensely popular hymn, particularly in the United States, where it is used for both religious and secular purposes. Newton wrote the words from personal experience; he grew up without any particular religious conviction, but his life's path was formed by a variety of twists and coincidences that were often put into motion by others' reactions to what they took as his recalcitrant insubordination. He was pressed (navally conscripted) into service with the Royal Navy, and after leaving the service, he became involved in the Atlantic slave trade. In 1748, a violent storm battered his vessel off the coast of County Donegal, Ireland, so severely that he called out to God for mercy. While this moment marked his spiritual conversion, he continued slave trading until 1754 or 1755, when he ended his seafaring altogether. Newton ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]