The library · Christmas
We Wish You a Merry Christmas
Traditional English carol
A quick waltz with an upbeat: the same figure three times, a step higher each time, then a refrain on a repeated note.
G major · 3/4 · 170 beats per minute · 24 bars · 26 s · intermediate level
A visiting song from the West Country
The greeting "A merry Christmas and a happy New Year" is recorded from the early 18th century, but the history of
the carol itself is unclear. It is linked to an old English custom: on Christmas Eve, singers went from door to
door, and wealthier households gave them treats, such as the "figgy pudding" that the later verses demand
without ceremony.
The version sung everywhere comes from the West Country, and might have stayed there without Arthur Warrell
(1883-1939), a Bristol composer, conductor and organist. He arranged it in four parts for his University of
Bristol Madrigal Singers, performed it in concert on 6 December 1935, and published it the same year with Oxford
University Press. In his version, by the way, the words are "I wish you", not "We wish you".
A figure that climbs, a refrain that stays put
Wolfi has you play the verse, the refrain, then the verse: twenty-four bars in G major, in three beats,
after an upbeat. The chords are my own. My map reads:
- The upbeat (bar 0): a D, on "We".
- A and B (bars 1 to 8): the same figure, "We wish you a merry Christmas", three times, a step higher each
time: it starts from G, then A, then B. The chords climb with it: C, A7,
B7. A stops in suspense (a half cadence), B ends on G with "and a happy New Year".
- C and B' (9 to 16): the refrain, "Good tidings we bring to you and your kin". Repeated Gs, long
notes, then the same ending as B.
- A and B (17 to 24): the verse comes back unchanged.
The form
The sections of the piece and their chords: the map you learn before playing a single note.
Pickup A B C B' A B
The key
- G major
- 1 sharp in the key signature: F♯
- Scale
- G · A · B · C · D · E · F♯
- Pillar chords
- I = G · IV = C · V7 = D7
The tricky passages
- Bar 5: fast runs (5.7 notes per second), 4-note chords
- Bar 14: fast runs (5.7 notes per second), a melodic leap (octave)
- Bar 21: fast runs (5.7 notes per second), 4-note chords
How to approach it
I rate it as intermediate, with a 10-day plan: it's a lively waltz, and the eighth notes need to stay
light.
- Count three beats and place the upbeat on the third: "one, two, We | wish…".
- The figure in A: learn it once, starting from G; the next two have the same shape, a step higher.
Keep the same fingering.
- The passages I flag: bars 5 and 21, eighth notes over a four-note chord in the left hand (B7);
bar 14, the octave leap from high D down to middle D.
- The left hand: one chord per bar, three in the cadence bars. Play them as block chords before
putting both hands together.
That's how my plan moves forward: the map, the chord framework, each phrase one after another, the tricky
passages, then everything put together and brought up to tempo, all the way to playing it by heart.