Silent Night music box
Silent Night is the gentlest of Christmas carols. It brings a little quiet to the busiest time of the year, which is why it is a favourite Christmas music box tune.
- Tune
- Silent Night
- Composer
- Franz Xaver Gruber; words by Joseph Mohr
- Origin
- First performed Christmas Eve 1818
The story behind the tune
Joseph Mohr, a young priest, wrote the words of “Stille Nacht” in 1816. Two years later he asked Franz Xaver Gruber, a schoolteacher and organist, to set them to music. The carol was first sung at St Nicholas Church in Oberndorf, near Salzburg, on Christmas Eve 1818, accompanied by guitar.
Travelling folk singers carried it across Europe, and the familiar English translation by John Freeman Young dates from 1859. The carol is now sung in hundreds of languages around the world.
How it sounds on a music box
Its slow, rocking rhythm and smooth melody already sound like a lullaby, so it suits a music box perfectly. Final arrangements for the Musical Drawer are still being developed.
Lovely for
- A baby’s first Christmas
- Christmas gifts for grandchildren
- A calm Advent tradition