I was listening to the radio as I drove to the station and being the time for carols, there was a carol. I don’t know the young woman who sang it but she had a fabulous and extraordinary voice, singing a favourite carol… she reached the highest of high notes seemingly without any difficulty, and she had a great gift for expression… However… for some reason, the letter ‘t’ had vanished… and the letter ‘d’ in places…
Silen nigh, holy nigh!
All is calm, all is brigh.
Round yon Virgin, Mother and Chile.
Holy infan so tender and mile,
Sleep in heavenly peas,
Sleep in heavenly peas
Silen nigh, holy nigh!
Shephers quake at the sigh.
Glories streaming from heaven afar
Heavenly hose sing Alleluia,
Chrise the Saviour is born!
Chrise the Saviour is born
Silent nigh, holy nigh!
Son of God love’s pure ligh.
Radian beams from Thy holy faze
With dawn of redeeming graze,
Jesus Lor, at Thy birth
Jesus Lor, at Thy birth
This makes me seem like a real old fogey, and I know that when singing sounds have to change sometimes, and I wasn’t thinking she should have overemphasised certain letters, no-one would want ‘night-a’, ‘bright-a’. ‘peasssssss-a’ but there is a way of giving the sound in a natural way.
And here’s the way to do it… with no peas!
Lois Elsden 