I still remember the feeling I got when I was a little boy listening to my folks sing Silent Night in the church choir at Pioneer Methodist Church in Auburn California. There was something mystical about it — like a dream. I can’t describe the feeling, but perhaps you have experienced something similar — the feeling that this is other-worldly and hugely important, but at the same time peaceful and serene.

That’s the feeling I was aiming for in this arrangement — very thoughtful and devotional and peaceful.

Watch this short video on arranging ideas for Silent Night and perhaps it will give you some ideas you can use too:

And if you haven’t already taken the course on arranging Christmas Carols, click here for info:

“The Secret of Arranging
Spectacularly Beautiful
Christmas Carols!”

PS Have you heard about The Case of the Hypocritical Reindeer?

“Silent Night”, like many songs, can be harmonized using just 3 chords. But there’s no limit to the number of chords that could be used — it is only limited to your imagination.
Watch this short video:

If you are interested in arranging carols like this, come on over to How To Play Spectacularly Beautiful Christmas Carols.

When you play familiar songs on the piano, you don’t have to play them the same way everyone else plays them. You can put your own spin on them — your own personal touch and express your emotions. It’s not hard — just ask yourself “How else can I harmonize this melody note than the traditional way?” “How else can I change the rhythm or the melody or the chords? How else can I voice the chords? Arpeggios? Block chords?”

Watch this short video and I think you will start coming up with your own ways of arranging songs in a fairly short period of time:

For a complete course in this sort of thing, please go to How To Play Spectaculary Beautiful Christmas Carols!

The Story of “Silent Night”

“And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night” Luke 2:8

In 1818, a group of actors were performing in many little towns throughout the Austrian Alps. On December 23 they came to the tiny village of Oberndorf, where they planned to perform the story of Christ’s birth.
Sadly, the church’s organ wasn’t working and could not be repaired in time for the show. The actors ended up presenting their show in a private home. Their presentation touched the church’s assistant pastor, Josef Mohr. So, that night, instead of going straight home, Mohr instead went up to a hill overlooking the village.
At the peak of the hill, he gazed down on beautiful snowy village below. His thoughts kept drifting back to the Christmas play he had just encountered. He remembered a poem he had written years earlier, it was a reflection back on the night when Christ was born.
Mohr thought the lyrics could make a nice carol for his church to sing the following at the Christmas eve service, but he didn’t have a tune to sing it to. So, Mohr went to see the church organist, Franz Xaver Gruber. Using his guitar he composed a melody to attach the poem to.
On Christmas Eve, Gruber and Mohr sang the song to their small congregation.
Weeks later, a well-known organ builder Karl Mauracher came to repair the church’s organ. When he completed the task, Gruber tested the instrument by playing the song he had written for Mohr’s poem. Mauracher was very impressed and took “Silent Night” back to his own Alpine village, Kapfing. There, two well-known families of singers, the Rainers and the Strassers, heard the song. Enthralled by it, both groups added “Silent Night” to their Christmas season repertoire.

The Strasser sisters exposed Northern Europe to the carol. In 1834, after their performance of “Silent Night” for King Frederick William IV of Prussia, he commanded his choir to sing it every Christmas eve.
The Rainers brought the song to the United States in 1839 where they sang it (in German) at the Alexander Hamilton Monument located outside New York City’s Trinity Church.
In 1863, almost fifty years after being writing in German, “Silent Night” was translated into English. Then in 1871 the English version was published in an American hymnal: Charles Hutchins’ Sunday School Hymnal.

Silent night! holy night!
All is calm, all is bright,
‘Round yon virgin mother and Child!
Holy Infant, so tender and mild,
Sleep in heavenly peace,
Sleep in heavenly peace.

Silent night, holy night
Shepherds quake at the sight
Glories stream from heaven afar
Heav’nly hosts sing Alleluia
Christ the savior is born
Christ the savior is born

Silent night, holy night
Son of God, love’s pure light
Radiant beams from thy holy face
With the dawn of redeeming grace
Jesus Lord, at thy birth
Jesus Lord, at thy birth

For a complete course on arranging beautiful Chrismas carols, please go to Christmas Carols On The Piano

Silent Night

This favorite carol was composed on a real ‘Silent Night.’ This famous carol might not have been written without a broken organ.

Possibly, it was the stillness of the moment that moved the Reverend Joseph Mohr to write those legendary verses in 1818. At the time, he was most likely motivated by sheer desperation as opposed to inspiration.

The Reverend Mohr was arranging the details for the Christmas Eve Mass in his parish within the tiny Oberndorf Village of Austria when he discovered the old church organ was out of order. With just a short time to go for the performance and the closest repairman days away, it seemed as though the Mass would have to go on without the arranged music.

Desperate to pull off a notable Christmas, Fr. Mohr ventured off to execute another arrangement. This all happened in the middle of his normal parish responsibilities as well as being asked to go out and bless a new baby. In the middle of this visit, Fr. Mohr was instantly hit by what the words to “Silent Night,” or “Stille Nacht” in German, really mean. He ended his conversation and rapidly made his way home, because he did not want to forget the lines that were quickly accumulating in his head.

In the English language the first four stanzas of Silent Night are: Silent Night, Holy night, All is Calm, all is bright, round yon’ virgin, mother and child. Holy infant so tender and mild, Sleep in Heavenly peace.

When he wrote the words down, he called his friend Franz Gruber, the parish choir director. In addition to his talent on the organ, Gruber was also an expert guitar player. Gruber forcefully told him that he was not a very good guitar player. Unfazed, Mohr offered his new verses of poetry to Gruber. Getting an old guitar, the two gentlemen wrote the music that would be known as the score for Oberndorf’s Christmas Mass.

Surely neither Mohr nor Gruber were aware of their future impact on history. For close to ten years, in fact, the song fell away into obscurity. It was, in fact, the Strasser family of Zillertal Valley that took the song “Silent Night” to a whole new musical level.

The talent of the Strasser children brought much business to their parents’ glove-making company. Not different from today’s talent scout finding a musical prodigy in the most precarious of places, the Strassers were presented with “Silent Night”. After being redone in four-part harmony the song catapulted the Strasser children to instant stardom. Because the Strasser children sounded so much like a choir of an angels the song was renamed “The Song From Heaven”. Because of their beautiful singing the Strassers were invited to perform in front of royalty.

It was possibly a king who prompted “Silent Night” to become a Christian standard. Twenty-two years after the Strasser children started performing it, King Frederick William IV of Prussia heard it and declared it should “be given first place in all future Christmas concerts” under his rule. The accuracy of the story has not been substantiated. What is clear, is that in spite of everything, “Silent Night” became a worldwide hit.

Silent Night

You can make an old Christmas Carol (or any song, for that matter) really come to life through the use of chord substitutions. Watch this free short video as I demonstrate how you can create an entirely new “feel” to an old carol such as “Silent Night”:

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If you enjoy this process, come on over to “The Secret of Arranging Spectacularly Beautiful Christmas Carols!”

Watch this short video for some ideas on re-harmonizing any song:

Using chord substitutions to re-harmonize a song is an excellent way to develop your own sound, your own style. For a complete course on arranging Christmas Carols on the Piano, click on this link:

Christmas Carols on the Piano

EVERYBODY Ought to Learn to Play At Least a Little Chord Piano!

There are roughly umpteen zillion reasons why you should learn

enough chords to be able to “chord a song” at the piano.

By “chord a song”, I mean the ability to play 3 or 4 chords on

the piano in some sort of rhythm while you or someone else sings

the tune. To do this, you don’t need to be a Van Cliburn; all you

need to do is learn a few basic chords and be able to more back

and forth between them in some organized rhythmic pattern.

For example, did you realize that all of these songs (and

hundreds more) can be sung or played with just 3 chords?

Auld Lang Syne

Amazing Grace

Kum Ba Ya

Silent Night

Joy To The World

Jingle Bells

Happy Birthday

Down In The Valley

On Top Of Old Smoky…

and hundreds or maybe thousands more!

Add just one more chord to the basic 3, and you can play another

thousand songs or so. So why not learn a few chords and start

your chording career?

Here are my top 10 reasons for learning “chord piano”:

1) It’s easy. Learn 3 chords and start in — it’s not rocket

science!

2) Even though it’s easy to get started, you don’t have to stop

there. You can learn more and more chords and more rhythm

patterns and get really good if you choose to.

3) You’ll be able to play “Happy Birthday” while the gang sings

it, since it only has 3 simple chords.

4) You’ll be able to play half-a-dozen Christmas carols like “Joy

To The World”, “Silent Night” because they too have just 3 simple

chords. In case you haven’t noticed, Christmas comes every year,

so every year you’ll get better as you participate in family

gatherings.

5) You can help your kids learn to play the piano, guitar, or

most any other instrument by learning chords. Most teachers don’t

teach chords, so you’ll be giving your kids an advantage by

learning chords.

6) People will admire you. It’s true. Musicians are popular.

Anyone who can play anything is in demand at parties and social

gatherings. And if you can “chord” while others sing, you’re

bound to be popular.

7) Piano playing using chords is good for your brain. Studies

have shown that people who actively participate in music do their

brain lots of good. And since chords require 3 or 4 notes at a

time instead of one, you are giving your brain a good workout.

Piano playing, particularly using chords, is good exercise for

your wrists and fingers. (Take the time to learn about correct

hand position, though!)

9) Piano playing is excellent therapy for the stress of life.

Many professional people come home from a hard days work and

relax by expressing their emotions on the keyboard. Play a few

dark and angry chords, and you’ll be surprised how much better

you feel!

10) Piano playing is a blast. It’s just plain old fun. So learn 3

or 4 chords and get going. Maybe you’ll stop there and enjoy it

the rest of your life.

But just maybe you’ll love it so much that you keep going and

turn yourself into an excellent piano player who can read music

as well as play chords!

To get started, go to http://www.chordpiano.com