Comments on: Silent Night

Silent Night

twoleftfeet — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 04:12:15 -0800

Silent Night in English, German, Irish, Arapaho, Czech, Italian, Finnish, Russian, Hungarian, Swedish, Norwegian, Portuguese, Japanese, French, Spanish and another 120 languages. The official song of the Christmas truce.

Additional performances by Simon & Garfunkel, John Denver & the Muppets, Elvis, Andy Williams, The White Stripes, Britney Spears, Frank Sinatra, The Three Tenors, Olivia Newton John, Bing Crosby, Tom Waits, Jewel, Stevie Nicks, Stevie Nicks with Tom Petty, Mariah Carey, Nat King Cole, Aaron Neville, Aretha Franklin, Martha Raye, Johnny Cash & his mother, Hanson, Christina Aguilera, Rick Astley, Barbra Streisand, The Mormon Tabernacle Choir (with Walter Cronkite), Mahalia Jackson, Dean Martin, Joan Baez, Tammy Wynette, in American Sign Language, Joe Satriani, Beyoncé, Bobby Darin, Pat Boone, Jess & Nick, Josh Groban, Neil Diamond, Johnny Mathis, Karen Carpenter, Bee Gees, Liza Minelli, Béla Fleck, Aaron Neville & Linda Rondstadt, David Hasselhoff, some cats, some more cats, and a drunk reindeer. A little history. Merry Xmas MeFi.

By: twoleftfeet

twoleftfeet — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 04:12:37 -0800

Actually though, my favorite Christmas song is O Holy Night. What's yours?

By: misteraitch

misteraitch — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 04:23:10 -0800

Recent events have lent an extra poignancy to the lovely a capella choral version of Silent Night on the Christmas in the Congo LP, which has been on my personal playlist lately.

By: Pollomacho

Pollomacho — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 04:31:37 -0800

Anybody got any advent songs?

By: dunkadunc

dunkadunc — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 04:50:33 -0800

Interestingly enough, Josef Mohr's house is right around the corner from my apartment, according to a plaque I noticed on the wall a few days ago.

By: twoleftfeet

twoleftfeet — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 05:28:18 -0800

Silent Night named as the public's favourite Christmas carol Sleep in heavenly peace.

By: Joe Beese

Joe Beese — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 06:45:43 -0800

official song of the Christmas truce VISA: official credit card of Whoville [sorry... still holding a grudge against the Widow Seuss for that one]

By: aether516

aether516 — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:15:22 -0800

Hebrew, Esperanto - even Pig Latin - but no Yiddish?

By: Slack-a-gogo

Slack-a-gogo — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:16:33 -0800

I'm sure Coldplay do a version of Silent Night that sounds suspiciously close to that Satriani version.

By: LN

LN — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:18:42 -0800

pollomacho, here you go. Advent song for you.

By: Nahum Tate

Nahum Tate — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 08:05:30 -0800

You forgot Chewbacca.

By: languagehat

languagehat — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 08:57:10 -0800

Nice post, and that history is fascinating. Poor Gruber! Although Franz Gruber wrote to music authorities in Berlin stating that he was the composer, the melody had been assumed to be the work of Haydn, Mozart or Beethoven at various times and these thoughts persisted even into the twentieth century. The controversy was put to rest in 1994 when a long-lost arrangement of "Stille Nacht" in the hand of Joseph Mohr was authenticated. In the upper right hand corner of the arrangement, Mohr wrote, "Melodie von Fr. Xav. Gruber."

By: Bageena

Bageena — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 09:05:05 -0800

I have always loved the version by Enya. Also, just slightly less beautiful, this version of Oh Holy Night. *sniff* Cartman and Enya go together like cheese and crackers.

By: RavinDave

RavinDave — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 09:25:54 -0800

"Oh dreidel, dreidel, dreidel, I made it out of clay ... "

By: fontophilic

fontophilic — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 09:47:08 -0800

This is my favorite version of O Holy Night. Without fail, when stores start pumping the Christmas carols, this song pops into my head. Allegedly it's an audition tape for a religious talent show.

By: Jpfed

Jpfed — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 10:39:49 -0800

Reading about the Christmas Truce always makes me tear up. The fact that later attempts at Christmas Truces were suppressed, and it never happened again, is sad to me. I don't think such a thing is possible anymore.

By: Pollomacho

Pollomacho — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 11:45:54 -0800

This is my favorite version of O Holy Night. My god, that was fantastic. That truly made my holiday season. So gloriously horrible, I couldn't tear myself away, though I wanted to in so many ways. Divine.

By: purpletangerine

purpletangerine — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 11:46:12 -0800

Nice post. I really enjoyed the Enya version; mostly 'cuz I like to read the Irish words, that don't look at all like what she's singing. So fascinating.

By: Bageena

Bageena — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 12:09:36 -0800

fontophilic, what in god's name is that? Besides, of course, THE GREATEST CHRISTMAS SONG EVER TOLD.

By: RavinDave

RavinDave — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 12:25:52 -0800

Paul Potts version.

By: filthy light thief

filthy light thief — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 12:49:44 -0800

The little church I went to when I was a kid had a Christmas Eve tradition, where the 11 pm service would end at midnight, and everyone would proceed out of the chapel by candle light, singing Silent Night. Thanks for reminding me of that, twoleftfeet. Now I'm off to check Silent Night out from the library.

By: filthy light thief

filthy light thief — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 12:53:21 -0800

... and then I'll have a marathon of the controversial Silent Night, Deadly Night movies at my house. And there's a remake in the works!

By: soonertbone

soonertbone — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 15:08:31 -0800

I'm a fan of this version.

By: neblina_matinal

neblina_matinal — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 09:00:02 -0800

The "Portuguese" version is anything but. A feeble attempt at Portuguese, maybe. I can't understand 90% of it - and it makes me wanna smack her on the head.

By: donnagirl

donnagirl — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 11:46:35 -0800

This one is a little less silent than the others.

By: twoleftfeet

twoleftfeet — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 01:34:05 -0800

A few more versions which are all interesting in one way or another: The Christmas Beatles, Joan Jett /Obama, Musical Saw, Richard Cheese, William Basinski, Farting Elves, Fredo Viola, Homey the Clown (at 5:12), A Punk's Silent Night, and Weird Commercial.

By: twoleftfeet

twoleftfeet — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 05:02:08 -0800

Clean Coal Carolers, Bill Clinton + Wayne Newton, O'Reilly