God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen - A Christmas Music Countdown

God rest ye merry gentlemen,
May nothing you dismay
Remember Christ our Saviour
Was born upon this Day.

“God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” is the un-merry Christmas carol. Wikipedia’s excellent musicologists tell us that is an English traditional Christmas carol. The melody is in a minor key and was published by William B. Sandys in 1833, although the author is unknown. There is a 1917 recording on the Wikipedia site. Bing Crosby recorded the song in 1945. Most recently, it was recorded by the cast of Glee.

Like so many early Christmas songs, this carol was written as a direct reaction to the music of the fifteenth century church. In Stories Behind the Best-Loved Songs of Christmas. However, in the as-yet earliest known publication of the carol on a circa 1760 broadsheet, it is described as a “new Christmas carol,” suggesting its origin is actually in the mid-18th century. It appeared again among "new carols for Christmas" in another 18th-century source, a chapbook believed to be printed between 1780-1800. In 1833 it appeared in Christmas Carols Ancient and Modern, a collection of seasonal carols gathered by William B. Sandys. The author is unknown.

It is referred to in Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol (1843): “..at the first sound of — “God bless you merry, gentlemen! May nothing you dismay!”— Scrooge seized the ruler with such energy of action, that the singer fled in terror, leaving the keyhole to the fog and even more congenial frost.”

There is some confusion today about the meaning of the first line, which seems archaic to our ears. It is usually given today as “God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen,” with a comma after the word “merry,” so does not refer to “merry gentlemen.” “Rest” here denotes “keep or make.” The claim that “merry” once meant “mighty,” and is so used here is not supported by the Oxford English Dictionary, which gives sixteen definitions of the word, some going back to the 10th century, all having to do with pleasure or enjoyment. In both of the 18th-century instances, "you" was used instead of “ye,” suggesting that the latter may be a modern insertion to make the carol sound more quaintly archaic.

Sometime in the 1990’s, a college friend and I went into New York City to see Patrick Stewart’s one-man version of “A Christmas Carol.” He did a good job. We could only get standing-room-only tickets for the show. But we were still young, so it was okay. If I could do a five-mile parade, I could stand for a two-hour show.

As you see in the above citation from Dickens, Scrooge throws a ruler at the caroler who sings “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.” At the end of Stewart’s performance, he sang the song to make amends for all of Scrooge’s wrong-doing:

Now to the Lord sing praises,
All you within this place,
And with true love and brotherhood
Each other now embrace;
This holytide of Christmas
All others doth deface:
O tidings of comfort and joy
Comfort and joy
O tidings of comfort and joy.

The words, of course, are wonderful. The singing – well, we didn’t have any rulers handy.  Singing the words along with him would have been impolite and impolitic, given Stewart’s star status; my friend was worried we’d get thrown out. So, I hummed the song (softly!!!) instead, hoping the rest of the audience would get the idea. They did. From back to front, the audience hummed along with him until he stopped at the last lines. A hush fell over the audience. Uh-oh! We were all in big trouble.  Well, he did tell us to sing.

He looked around at the audience, smiled (I think he smiled; we were pretty far back), and finished the song (in key). We weren’t trying to insult his singing or anything. Given the season, it was just the – neighborly – thing to do.