Silent Night - Franz Xaver Gruber (arr. Duarte)
Christmas Carols and Songs for Guitar - Steven Saulls, Classical Guitarist About the music and the composer… "Silent Night" (German: "Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht") is a popular Christmas carol, composed in 1818 by Franz Xaver Gruber to lyrics by Joseph Mohr in the small town of Oberndorf bei Salzburg, Austria. It was declared an intangible cultural heritage by UNESCO in 2011. The song was first recorded in 1905 and has remained a popular success, appearing in films and multiple successful recordings, as well as being quoted in other musical compositions. "Stille Nacht" was first performed on Christmas Eve 1818 at St. Nicholas parish church in Oberndorf, a village in the Austrian Empireon the Salzach river in present-day Austria. A young Catholic priest, Father Joseph Mohr, had come to Oberndorf the year before. In the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars, he had written the poem "Stille Nacht" in 1816 at Mariapfarr, the hometown of his father in the Salzburg Lungau region, where Joseph had worked as an assistant priest. The melody was composed by Franz Xaver Gruber, schoolmaster and organist in the nearby village of Arnsdorf, now part of Lamprechtshausen. On Christmas Eve 1818, Mohr brought the words to Gruber and asked him to compose a melody and guitar accompaniment for that night's mass, after river flooding had possibly damaged the church organ. The church was eventually destroyed by repeated flooding and replaced with the Silent-Night-Chapel. It is unknown what inspired Mohr to write the lyrics, or what prompted him to create a new carol. According to Gruber, Karl Mauracher, an organ builder who serviced the instrument at the Oberndorf church, was enamored of the song, and took the composition home with him to the Zillertal. From there, two travelling families of folk singers, the Strassers and the Rainers, included the tune in their shows. The Rainers were already singing it around Christmas 1819, and once performed it for an audience that included Franz I of Austria and Alexander I of Russia, as well as making the first performance of the song in the U.S., in New York City in 1839.[1] By the 1840s the song was well known in Lower Saxony and was reported to be a favorite of Frederick William IV of Prussia. During this period, the melody changed slightly to become the version that is commonly played today. Over the years, because the original manuscript had been lost, Mohr's name was forgotten and although Gruber was known to be the composer, many people assumed the melody was composed by a famous composer, and it was variously attributed to Haydn, Mozart, or Beethoven. However, a manuscript was discovered in 1995 in Mohr's handwriting and dated by researchers as c. 1820. It states that Mohr wrote the words in 1816 when he was assigned to a pilgrim church in Mariapfarr, Austria, and shows that the music was composed by Gruber in 1818. This is the earliest manuscript that exists and the only one in Mohr's handwriting. In 1859, the Episcopal priest John Freeman Young, then serving at Trinity Church, New York City, wrote and published the English translation that is most frequently sung today, translated from three of Mohr's original six verses. The version of the melody that is generally used today is a slow, meditative lullaby or pastorale, differing slightly (particularly in the final strain) from Gruber's original, which was a "moderato" tune in 68 time and Siciliana rhythm. Today, the lyrics and melody are in the public domain, although newer translations usually are not. In 1998 the Silent Night Museum in Salzburg commissioned a new English translation by Bettina Klein of Mohr's German lyrics.(Wikipedia) About the performer... Steven began studying the guitar at age nine and has attended some of the finest music schools in the world including the Berklee College of Music (Boston), and the Mozarteum (Salzburg, Austria). He holds both a Bachelor of Arts degree from Western Washington University (1980) and a Master of Music degree from the University of Arizona (1982). Over the past 40 years, Steven has performed hundreds of concerts throughout the United States, Central & South America and Europe. His debut recordings ‘Espressivo’ and ‘Steven Saulls Plays Works by Ponce, Torroba & Bach’ have received wide acclaim both nationally and internationally. In addition to solo concerts, he has performed over 200 chamber works including guitar concerti (with orchestra) by Vivaldi, Ponce and Rodrigo. About the recording... Recorded at The Steven Saulls Guitar Studio, Sahuarita, Arizona 2022/Guitar handcrafted by Martin Blackwell. Copyright© 2022 Steven Saulls, Sahuarita, Arizona For additional information please contact Steven Saulls at [email protected]
