95: The Stories Behind 5 Classic Christmas Carols to learn about in your homeschool

Have you ever wondered how Silent Night came to be written on Christmas Eve because a church organ broke? Or why Joy to the World wasn’t originally about Christmas at all? In this episode of the Music in Our Homeschool Podcast, Gena Mayo reveals the fascinating true stories behind five of the most beloved Christmas carols ever written.

Each carol has a history filled with creativity, faith, and surprise — perfect for turning into mini music appreciation lessons during your homeschool Christmas School!

🎶 You’ll hear about:

• Silent Night — born from an organ malfunction and a humble guitar.
• Joy to the World — a paraphrase of Psalm 98, not the Nativity.
• O Holy Night — the first song ever broadcast over radio airwaves.
• The First Noel — a folk carol carried through generations before hymnbooks existed.
• Hark! The Herald Angels Sing — how “welkin” became “the herald angels” and why a Mendelssohn melody made it soar.

Through these stories, Gena shows how Christmas carols connect us to history, scripture, and timeless beauty — giving your homeschool a richer way to celebrate the season.

🎄 Visit the accompanying blog post for listening links, printable activities, and simple ideas to turn this episode into a full lesson: MusicinOurHomeschool.com/ClassicChristmasCarols

If you’re looking for ready-to-go lessons, explore Music of Christmas inside the Music in Our Homeschool membership — three years of 15-minute Christmas lessons for every age!

Find links to all resources mentioned in this episode here: https://musicinourhomeschool.com/ClassicChristmasCarols 

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Transcript

E95 The Stories Behind 5 Classic Christmas Carols

Gena: [00:00:00] Hello, Harmony Heroes. Welcome back to the Music in Our Homeschool podcast. I'm your host, Gena Mayo, and today we're taking a deep, beautiful journey into the stories behind five classic Christmas carols. One of the reasons I love Christmas music so much is that it has a way of opening our hearts. These songs carry history, theology, poetry, longing, and sometimes even personal struggle.

When we know their stories, we hear them differently and we sing them differently. In our homeschools, they become not just background music for December, but opportunities to teach our children about faith, culture, and creativity. For today's episode, we'll walk through five beloved Christmas carols and uncover the fascinating people, moments, and surprises behind each creation. Each story is perfect to turn into a short music appreciation lesson in your home.

Let's begin with one of the most [00:01:00] peaceful Christmas carols ever written. Silent Night might feel like it's always been a part of Christmas, but its origins are really quite humble. In fact, it began with a problem. It was Christmas Eve in 1818 in the small Austrian village of Obendorf. St. Nicholas Church was preparing for midnight mass when the organ suddenly failed, which meant there was no way to accompany the service. A young priest, Joseph Mohr, remembered a poem he had written a couple of years earlier, after hiking through the snowy countryside and reflecting on the stillness of the night.

He brought the poem to his friend, Franz Gruber , and asked if he could quickly set the music to guitar. Gruber composed a gentle flowing melody that fit the peaceful words perfectly. And that night, Mohr and Gruber sang Silent Night for the very first time, accompanied only by a simple guitar.[00:02:00] 

The people in that tiny village had no idea their unexpected crisis solution will become one of the most recorded and beloved Christmas songs in history. Silent Night has been translated into countless languages and sung by millions of people for more than 200 years.

If you have one of the following courses of mine: Music of Christmas, Music Lessons for Holidays and Special Days, or Winter Music Lessons for Holidays and Special Days, you can delve into the song even deeper and learn about another very special story related to the singing of Silent Night, the Christmas Truce of 1914.

Our second Christmas, Carol has an unusually long and layered history. Isaac Watts wrote the text to Joy to the World in 1719. Watts was a pastor and a poet who wanted congregations to sing scripture in ways that were [00:03:00] joyful, clear, and poetic. Joy to the World was a paraphrase of Psalm 98, celebrating the coming of the Lord.

What's interesting is that Watts was not writing about Christ's birth at all. He was pointing toward Christ's second coming and his reign. More than a century later, American composer Lowell Mason, adapted the melody that was partly inspired by the musical style of Handel, especially the dotted rhythms and the grandeur Handel was known for. Mason paired that melody with Watts's text, and the version we sing today of Joy to the World was born. Over time, congregations naturally gravitated towards singing it at Christmastime, perhaps because of its triumphant mood that fits so perfectly with the celebration of Christ coming into the world.

A fun homeschool activity would be to look up Psalm 98 together and compare the text of the Psalm with Watt's p [00:04:00] oetic paraphrase.

O Holy Night has perhaps the most dramatic origin story of the five we'll discuss today. In 1847, a small French parish asked poet Placide Cappeau to write a Christmas poem.

Cappeau wasn't particularly religious, but he accepted the request. Inspired by the Gospel of Luke. He wrote the soaring reverent text that we know today. Cappeau then asked his friend, Adolfe Adam, a well-known composer of ballet and opera, to set his poem to music. Adam created a sweeping melody with huge emotional range, from quiet reflection to powerful declaration.

The song was immediately loved by the French people. B ut the church later tried to ban it after learning that Cappeau had drifted away from the faith and that Adam was Jewish. But the carol was already in the hearts of the [00:05:00] people, and they continued singing it.

Decades later, on Christmas Eve, 1906, O Holy Night, entered history again. Inventor Reginald Fessenden made the first radio broadcast ever sent with the human voice. He read part of Luke 2 over the airwaves in Brant Rock, Massachusetts, and then he lifted his violin and played O Holy Night. It became the first piece of music ever transmitted over radio.

The First Noel is one of the oldest carols still sung today. It probably originated in the 1400s or 1500s, in England, long before most people had access to hymn books. Because of that, the carol was part of oral tradition. Songs were passed from family to family and from village to village, especially in rural communities. The word Noel simply means Christmas, from the French word [00:06:00] relating to birth.

This was truly the first Christmas song for many English families. The long soaring melody of The First Noel reflects its folk origins. When a song is passed down orally, it often develops repetitive lines and memorable patterns because that makes it easier to remember. You can almost picture t he villagers singing it outdoors during Christmastide, retelling the story of the angels, the shepherds, and the Wise Men.

Our final carol, Hark, the Herald Angels Sing, is a wonderful example of how Christmas music can evolve through many hands and many centuries. The original text was written in 1739 by Charles Wesley, one of the most prolific hymn writers in history.

His first line is not the one that we sing today, though. He wrote "Hark! How all the welkin rings," using an old English term, meaning the vault of [00:07:00] heaven. It was rich with meaning, but not easy for a congregation to understand. A generation later, George Whitefield, a leader in the American Great Awakening revival, edited the hymn to make it more singable. He replaced "welkin" with "the herald angels," and the carol became immediately more accessible.

But the tune that we now sing didn't appear until 1855. German composer Felix Mendelssohn wrote the melody years earlier for a secular celebration marking the 400th anniversary of Gutenberg's printing press. Mendelssohn himself said the tune wasn't suited for sacred words, but William Cummings, an English musician, thought it matched Wesley's text beautifully. He paired them together and it became the triumphant Carol we know today.

What all these stories have in common is that Christmas music doesn't just appear out of [00:08:00] nowhere. These carols were born from real people, real creativity, and real history. When we share these stories with our children, we give them more than just melodies to sing.

We give them connections to the past, an understanding of where our traditions come from, and a deeper appreciation for the beauty of the season.

Here are a few easy ways to turn this podcast episode into a music appreciation lesson for your homeschool. You'll find them at the accompanying blog post at MusicinOurHomeschool.com/ClassicChristmasCarols. You can listen to two or three different versions of the same carol and compare them. You can look up the original poems or scripture passages behind the lyrics. You can have your children illustrate one stanza of a carol. You can explore how each carol's style reflects the time period.

If you need something completely ready to go for [00:09:00] your homeschool's Christmas School, remember that inside my Music of Christmas course, you'll find three years' worth of easy-to-use, 15-minute Christmas music lessons.

These are all designed to fit right into your December rhythm using the 15-Minute Music Method. They're simple, meaningful, and perfect for multi-age families.

Thank you for spending this time with me today. I hope these stories enrich your Christmas season and bring more joy to your homeschool this December.

I'll see you next time on the Music in Our Homeschool podcast.

Find links to all resources mentioned in this episode here: https://musicinourhomeschool.com/ClassicChristmasCarols