I've wanted to write a Christmas song for about as long as I've been writing music, which is to say, over 25 years. But finding the right idea is hard. For better or worse, I tend to find inspiration in responding, supportively or otherwise, to other people's work. That's what happened with this song.
The inspiration I needed came a couple years ago while I was responding in a decidedly "otherwise" fashion to the song "Mary, Did You Know?" Like, of course she knew. Of course. Maybe not all the specifics, but she literally had an angel come and tell her ahead of time who this little baby would be. She had to know it and willingly submit to the calling to carry and raise the child. That's what that whole "be it unto me according to thy word" thing was about. How can you read her story and still be wondering that? Which means the framing of that song is just a rhetorical device, but the falseness of its premise means that it's a dishonest one. That bugs me. Probably too much.
The same goes for other Christmas, or just religious songs that are too certain of themselves. They're too much about painting a neat picture that solves all our problems while they oppress us with forced emotion but don't actually speak to the needs of the soul. These songs don't leave room for faith because they provide all the answers, and the ones they provide are usually lacking. Sorely.
To me, Christmas is about faith. It's about wonder. It's about looking to that first glimmer of light in a long, dark night and being motivated by the hope it brings. Christ's birth isn't an endpoint, it's a beginning. It's a joyful shout that rouses you to renewed effort because you've suddenly been given cause to believe, against all mortal reason, that deliverance will come. Not that it already has come. Take away the uncertainty, the anticipation, or the darkness, and you've got Easter, not Christmas.
So I asked myself, what do we actually know about the Christ child? How fully-realized a redeemer did we have in the baby Jesus? And what are some better questions to ask than "Mary, Did You Know?"
(Of course she knew).
I've wrestled with this for a year or two now, and finally figured out what to do with it this weekend. Here it is. It's written for choir, as usual, and exported from MuseScore, not actually performed.
Here's the sheet music, free to use for live performance or education. If you want to use it in some other way, contact me. No matter how you use it, I'd love to hear about it!
Full score:
A more compact version (smaller print, fewer pages, like the video)
Accompaniment only:
Merry Christmas!
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