Talk:Silent Night

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This article was the featured article of the Music Portal in December 2006.
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Contents

[edit] Stille Nacht

Shouldn't this page be moved to Stille Nacht, its original title? -leigh (φθόγγος) 19:51, Dec 5, 2004 (UTC)

Not necessarily. But I have just created a redirect page so whoever is looking for the song under its German title will find it. <KF> 20:24, Dec 7, 2004 (UTC)

[edit] languages

Why are there Portuguese lyrics? English, okay, it's the English Wikipedia. German, okay, it was originally written in German. But the article says it is sung in 300 languages... why do we show Portuguese over any of the other 297? I'd say just leave the English and German lyrics. Acheron 18:29, 25 Dec 2004 (UTC)

[edit] English Lyrics

Given we already have the lyrics in wikisource, do we still need to keep the English lyrics in the article? Would it be redundent? --Hurricane111 23:23, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Because they are relatively short, and people looking up this article would most likely expect to see the lyrics?
What Wikisource does or does not contain is not a consequential factor in determining the appropriate content for an encyclopaedia article.
zoney ♣ talk 21:58, 15 December 2005 (UTC)


When were the English lyrics written?

Rev. John Freeman Young (1820-1885) translated three verses of "Stille Nacht" when he was assistant rector at Trinity Church (Episcopal) in New York City (1860-67). His version of the 1st, 6th, and 2nd verses of Joseph Mohr's original text first appeared in 1863 when it was published in "The Sunday-School Service and Tune Book." These are the same three verses that are used today in English-language hymnals. Rev. Young later became the second Episcopal Bishop of Florida (1867-85). His grave is in the Old City Cemetery in Jacksonville, Florida.

[edit] Origins of English version

Is it true that the English version first became popular/was first created during the First World War, when German troops were singing the German version in the trenches, and the British troops heard it and translated it into English, or is this just an urban myth? TomPhil (talk) 16:10, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

It may or may not be true. SOme sources say Silent Night wasn't popular in the US until after the First World War, where US troops heard the Germans sing it. IronCrow 05:01, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Alternate German lyrics

The Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, whose member were German speakers in the 19th century, had a different set of lyrics, which are used today in some of their churches even though services are in English. They were printed in a Youth Hymnal in the 1890s. I believe all the verses were different, but remember only the first one, which goes "Stille nacht, heilege nacht, alles schlaft, Einsam wacht, nur das Heilege Eltern Paar, das im Stalle zu Bethlehem war, bei dem himmlischen Kind, bei dem himmlischen kind." How did it happen that those Germans brought a variant version over to the U.S. in the 19th century? Edison 21:42, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] reverts

When I load this page, the "History" section begins with, "Sarah has been with her hottiesThe carol..." I went to edit it, but there, the text is clean. Someone with technical skill, please look into it.

  • Hi, I was the one who reverted that edit as vandalism - and you must have been looking at it about the same time I was taking that out. Cricket02 14:38, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Recordings

I suggest the section be removed. It's not feasible to list the thousands of recordings of this tune. The main use of this list is probably for spam and self-promotion. Wake 20:50, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

I've tagged this section and plan to take a razor to in a couple weeks. We should only list recordings that are somehow notable, not just every time somebody records the song. Torc2 (talk) 23:15, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
I've made amendments to some of the recordings I've listed and deleted some that might not be notable enough for this article. Will it be better that we tracked down the names of the albums from where these recordings came from? It might show people that we have been researching. Yip1982 (talk) 13:01, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
This is just me being a stickler, but can we put them in chronlogical order please! I'll do a few, but I'm only on here for about 3 minutes.Dragon909 (talk) 13:24, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, I'll read before I edit in future, but in chronological order seems to make more sense than Alphabetical
Sorry, I really disagree with this, for two reasons:
  • Chronology hasn't affected the song itself at all. It's a somewhat meaningless metric.
  • Some recording dates might be unknown, or imprecise. Sometimes we'll only have years instead of dates of recording, or dates of release instead of dates of recording. Dates also require citations, whereas alphabetical only requires an ability to alphabetize.
Torc2 (talk) 20:24, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
The section is not relevant to the article.Yaki-gaijin (talk) 01:03, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
I tend to agree, but there's probably certain recording that are worth being mentioned if they meet objective criteria, such as selling a certain number of copies or appearing on a Billboard or other international music chart. Torc2 (talk) 22:51, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Trivia

Not only do I agree that the recordings section be removed as it is woefully incomplete and ridiculously selective, but I would also query why a reference to a Damien Rice cover "With modified lyrics" is in the Trivia section and yet a reference to the Simon and Garfunkel cover -- with the original lyrics but backing from the news -- was apparently removed some time back. In all honesty, who the hell cares about Damien Rice? What makes him better than anyone else who has ever recorded the song that he be mentioned in the trivia section...?

"The song was sung simultaneously in English and German by troops during the Christmas truce of 1914, as it was one of the few carols that soldiers on both sides of the front line knew." - This may be more urban myth than fact. Rifleman Graham Williams quoted in Brown and Seaton's book, Christmas Truce, says of the Germans singing Stille Nacht: 'This was actually the first time I heard this carol, which was not then so popular in this country as it has since become'. He says O Come All Ye Faithful was the hymn which both sides started singing together and our own research of soldiers' letters reprinted in UK papers (www.christmastruce.co.uk) suggests Home Sweet Home was the song that mellowed the troops most - as it apparently did 50 years earlier during the American Civil War! - Alan Cleaver —Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.209.19.200 (talk) 15:04, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree with the first guy... The Trivia section is pointless, and the last statement has been taken out by me because it's just ridiculous. Every Christmas carol has mondegreens. Not only that, but the Damien Rice cover isn't really notable. IronCrow 04:59, 16 November 2007 (UTC)
It's gone. The information has been incorporated into other sections. (Or discarded - LBJ liking the song is really irrelevant.) Torc2 (talk) 23:21, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Lyrics in other languages (Japanese, French, etc.)

What are the lyrics to Silent Night in Japanese, French, etc.? Angie Y. 22:49, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

http://www.visit-salzburg.net/travel/silentnightlyrics.htm

Kiyoshi kono yoru hoshi wa hikari sukui nomiko wa mabune no naka ni nemuri tamo-o. itoyasuku.

Kiyoshi kono yoru mitsuge ukeshi makibitotachi wa miko no mimae ni nukazukinu, kashikomite.

Kiyoshi kono yoru miko no emi ni, megumi no miyo no ashita no hikari kagayakeri, hogarakani.

[edit] Restructuring section on recordings

Will it be better that perhaps we can amend the structure of the recordings section? I think it might make sense to have the recordings listed in different groups. We should have them listed under artist and album, and yet we should sort them into English recordings, German recordings and recordings in other languages (including multilingual renditions). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Yip1982 (talk • contribs) 04:29, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Languages to include

OK, we include the German version because it was the original. We include the English because it's the English Wiki. Why do we have Dutch and Gaelic? Torc2 (talk) 08:06, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

How about the Jingle Cats version? Isn't that one important enough to belong here too!? Asteriks (talk) 14:12, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Original melody

"The version of the melody that is generally sung today differs slightly (particularly in the final strain) from Gruber's original." Is the original meoldy included on the site, or just the more familiar version? --Scottandrewhutchins (talk) 17:34, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] *An arrangement for Guitar, Flute and Violin for free use in services

I am curious as to what is wrong with this link that it keeps getting removed. It's obviously not spam, considering it is a valid link and is in reference to the article. But what's wrong with posting a link to your own website? For example, let's say I discover a new type of frog, and I want to write a wiki abut it. I would most likely list my own website as an external link so people could read about the frog's discovery. Bob the Wikipedian, a WikiDragon (talk) 19:53, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually, that's already not allowed. :) But I understand the general point. There is an inherent conflict of interest between the desire to help readers of the encyclopedia find what they are interested in (good) and to use the encyclopedia as a way of getting people interested in/using your own site (bad). Suppose you write an article about frogs and it's published in Nature: well, you shouldn't add refs to your own work, so you'll just have to wait for someone else to do it. And if that's true for Nature, then it's certainly true for your own website. (And if it's an open wiki, then it's generally not allowed as an external link at all, except in quite limited circumstances). If the material isn't original research, and is verifiable, then the thing to do is not to link to it, but to make it a part of the encyclopedia directly. In this case, the editor interested in the files is going to work on uploading them to Wikimedia commons, and then add the links in to the articles, which is unquestionably the ideal thing all round. Tb (talk) 20:40, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
Point taken. So as you have expanded this topic to references, you're saying that a researcher may not post to Wikipedia, only to their own websites? Bob the Wikipedian, a WikiDragon (talk) 21:16, 8 April 2008 (UTC)