The rousing orchestral and choral climax features the following stanza, a conventional New Year’s salutation (Routley, 1958, p. Stanzas of “God Rest You Merry” are featured throughout the work, sometimes “mashed up” with other carols. (1912), a collage of Christmas folksongs, most of which were collected in southern England by Vaughan Williams and the famous folksong scholar Cecil Sharp (1859-1924), sometimes called the founding father of the folksong revival in England. Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1858) included “God Rest You Merry Gentlemen” in his popular work for baritone, chorus, and orchestra, Fantasia on Christmas Carols Unlike “The First Noel,” this carol features only the adoration of the shepherds in Luke 2 and not the appearance of the Magi in Matthew’s account. Though its roots are somewhat ambiguous, it seems to have been well known by the time Charles Dickens published his famous A Christmas Carol (1843) when Ebenezer Scrooge heard it being sung outside the door of his office on Christmas Eve, he “seized the ruler with such energy of action, that the singer fled in terror” (Watson, Canterbury, n.p.).Įminent British hymnologist Erik Routley (1939-1982) classifies this song and “The First Noel” as “ballad-carol.” Rather than the standard hymn meters – Short (6686), Common (8686), and Long (8888) – “God Rest You merry” employs longer three-line stanzas and a refrain associated with many folk ballads (Routley, 1958, p. While selected Protestant hymnals carry the hymn, its apparent English ethnicity conveyed by its language, melody, and possible social use require adaptations to make it appropriate for liturgy. It is much more likely to be found in Episcopal and Anglican hymnals in the USA, Great Britain, Canada, and Australia, as well as a number of Catholic collections. Indeed, “God rest you merry gentlemen” does not appear in earlier Methodist hymnals. This is a somewhat curious entry in a United Methodist hymnal supplement. To save us all from Satan’s power when we were gone astray. God rest you merry, gentlemen, let nothing you dismay,įor Jesus Christ our Savior was born upon this day,
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