Song Stories: Hodie Christus Natus Est

Hodie Christus Natus Est
UPDATE!
Following much recent interest in this Christmas anthem including new performances and new versions adapted for specific choirs, I have made a little video for it! Have a look and a listen, then read on to hear the story of this very popular song!

It’s all about today!

Hodie Christus natus est:
Hodie Salvator apparuit:
Hodie in terra canunt Angeli,
laetantur Archangeli
Hodie exsultant justi, dicentes:
Gloria in excelsis Deo.
Alleluia.

Today Christ is born:
Today the Saviour appears:
Today the Angels sing on all the earth,
Archangels rejoice:
Today the righteous rejoice, saying:
Glory to God in the highest.
Alleluia.

This is the fifth of the “Five Christmas Fanfares” for 8-part choir, but is in fact the first to be composed.

Go to Five Christmas Fanfares

This occurred way back in 1993 when I was living in Dunedin, New Zealand. I was employed by the friends of Woodford House School in Havelock North to be one of their three Artists-in Residence – a gift to the school to celebrate their centenary.

As part of this residency, I was asked to compose a piece for the whole school to sing which would also have small sections for the elite “Chapel Choir”. zigzag treeI composed the “everyone” sections and taught it to the four houses of the school in the chapel on the same afternoon. The Chapel Choir then went on to learn the semi-chorus sections, and it was performed at the end of the centenary year by the entire school.

Since then it has undergone a few transformations, merely to accommodate different voicings in different choirs who wanted to perform it, so now there are several versions:

Go to Hodie Christus Natus Est for high voices
Go to Hodie Christus Natus Est for low voices
Go to Hodie Christus Natus Est for mixed voices

It has proved exceedingly popular over the years, and has been performed and recorded many times including by Norwich Cathedral Choir, New Zealand Secondary Schools Choir, Hexham Cathedral, Otago Boy’s High School, Queensland Choir, numerous choirs in New Zealand’s Big Sing, and above, most beautifully by Rock Festival Choir.

One of the most recent performances, from June 2015 is of the low voices version by All The King’s Men of Auckland, New Zealand:

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