Favorite Christmas carols

I've said before I tend to be rather "High Church" in my preferences for how Christmas services are done. (Which is interesting, considering that the origins of the denomination to which I belong were at least partly in one of the Scots "dissenter" groups who were opposed to all the High Churchery. Well, my feeling is: there's so much in daily life that's so awful and mundane, that one in a while I want something that's special and solemn-in-an-enjoyable-way.)

Once in a while I've been lucky enough to catch the "Service of Lessons and Carols" from Britain when it's run on PBS or somewhere here in the states, and for a couple years, the church I was attending did a lessons-and-carols service.

So here's just a sampling of my favorites. I particularly love the British choral-music style:





I confess: I prefer the tune for "Away in the Manger" that's more commonly used in Britain to the one that's more commonly used here.

And the Sussex Carol! I LOVE the Sussex Carol, both the tune and the words. It captures for me the sense of "relief" that thinking about Christmas belongs, with remembering that what is wrong in the world now will eventually be sorted out and made right:



And another one I love, "Tomorrow shall be my dancing day." You can really hear the history in this one - I've read that it was inspired by the idea of taking the idea of dancing, and some of the romantic songs of the time, and applying them to Jesus' life ("I call my true love to my dance...")



I think one of the reasons I like these old carols so much is that you rarely hear them Muzak-ified or repurposed for advertising. (Garmin has pretty much ruined "Carol of the Bells" for me).