The "Coventry Carol" is a Christmas carol

Christmas carol

A Christmas carol is a carol whose lyrics are on the theme of Christmas or the winter season in general and which are traditionally sung in the period before Christmas.-History:...

 dating from the 16th century. The carol was performed in Coventry

Coventry

Coventry is a city and metropolitan borough in the county of West Midlands in England. Coventry is the 9th largest city in England and the 11th largest in the United Kingdom. It is also the second largest city in the English Midlands, after Birmingham, with a population of 300,848, although...

 in England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 as part of a mystery play

Mystery play

Mystery plays and miracle plays are among the earliest formally developed plays in medieval Europe. Medieval mystery plays focused on the representation of Bible stories in churches as tableaux with accompanying antiphonal song...

 called The Pageant of the Shearmen and Tailors

Coventry Mystery Plays

The Coventry Mystery Plays, or Coventry Corpus Christi Pageants, are a cycle of medieval mystery plays from Coventry, West Midlands, England, and are perhaps best known as the source of the "Coventry Carol". Two plays from the original cycle are extant having been copied from the now lost original...

. The play depicts the Christmas

Christmas

Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...

 story from chapter two in the Gospel of Matthew

Gospel of Matthew

The Gospel According to Matthew is one of the four canonical gospels, one of the three synoptic gospels, and the first book of the New Testament. It tells of the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth...

. The carol refers to the Massacre of the Innocents

Massacre of the Innocents

The Massacre of the Innocents is an episode of infanticide by the King of Judea, Herod the Great. According to the Gospel of Matthew Herod orders the execution of all young male children in the village of Bethlehem, so as to avoid the loss of his throne to a newborn King of the Jews whose birth...

, in which Herod

Herod the Great

Herod , also known as Herod the Great , was a Roman client king of Judea. His epithet of "the Great" is widely disputed as he is described as "a madman who murdered his own family and a great many rabbis." He is also known for his colossal building projects in Jerusalem and elsewhere, including his...

 orders all male infants under the age of two in Bethlehem

Bethlehem

Bethlehem is a Palestinian city in the central West Bank of the Jordan River, near Israel and approximately south of Jerusalem, with a population of about 30,000 people. It is the capital of the Bethlehem Governorate of the Palestinian National Authority and a hub of Palestinian culture and tourism...

 to be killed. The lyrics of this haunting carol represent a mother's lament for her doomed child. It is the only carol that has survived from this play.

It is notable as a well-known example of a Picardy third

Picardy third

A Picardy third is a harmonic device used in European classical music.It refers to the use of a major chord of the tonic at the end of a musical section which is either modal or in a minor key...

. The author is unknown. The oldest known text was written down by Robert Croo in 1534, and the oldest known printing of the melody dates from 1591. The carol is traditionally sung a cappella

A cappella

A cappella music is specifically solo or group singing without instrumental sound, or a piece intended to be performed in this way. It is the opposite of cantata, which is accompanied singing. A cappella was originally intended to differentiate between Renaissance polyphony and Baroque concertato...

. There is an alternative setting of the carol by Kenneth Leighton

Kenneth Leighton

Kenneth Leighton was a British composer and pianist. His compositions include much Anglican church music, and many pieces for choir and for piano as well as concertos, symphonies, much chamber music and an opera. He wrote a well-known setting of the Coventry Carol...

.

Lyrics

The only manuscript copy to have survived into recent times was burnt in 1875. Our knowledge of the lyrics is therefore based on two very poor quality transcriptions from the early nineteenth century, and there is considerable doubt about many of the words. Some of the transcribed words are difficult to make sense of: for example, in the last verse "And ever morne and may For thi parting Neither say nor singe" is not clear. Various modern editors have made different attempts to make sense of the words, so such variations may be found as "ever mourn and say", "every morn and day", "ever mourn and sigh". The following is one attempted reconstruction.

Lully, lullay, Thou little tiny Child,

Bye, bye, lully, lullay.

Lullay, thou little tiny Child,

Bye, bye, lully, lullay.

O sisters too, how may we do,

For to preserve this day

This poor youngling for whom we do sing

Bye, bye, lully, lullay.

Herod, the king, in his raging,

Charged he hath this day

His men of might, in his own sight,

All young children to slay.

That woe is me, poor Child for Thee!

And ever mourn and sigh,

For thy parting neither say nor sing,

Bye, bye, lully, lullay.

Artists

Many performers have recorded the song, including Anthony Newley

Anthony Newley

Anthony George Newley was an English actor, singer and songwriter. He enjoyed success as a performer in such diverse fields as rock and roll and stage and screen acting.-Early life:...

, Sting, Annie Lennox

Annie Lennox

Annie Lennox, OBE , born Ann Lennox, is a Scottish singer-songwriter, political activist and philanthropist. After achieving minor success in the late 1970s with The Tourists, with fellow musician David A...

, Christine McVie

Christine McVie

Christine McVie is an English rock singer, keyboardist, and songwriter. Her primary fame came as a member of the British/American rock band Fleetwood Mac, though she has also released three solo albums...

, Mediæval Bæbes

Mediæval Bæbes

The Mediæval Bæbes are a British ensemble of female musicians founded in the 1990s by Katharine Blake and included some of her colleagues from the band Miranda Sex Garden, as well as other friends who share her love of mediaeval music...

, Tori Amos

Tori Amos

Tori Amos is an American pianist, singer-songwriter and composer. She was at the forefront of a number of female singer-songwriters in the early 1990s and was noteworthy early in her career as one of the few alternative rock performers to use a piano as her primary instrument...

, Elaine Paige

Elaine Paige

Elaine Paige OBE is an English singer and actress best known for her work in musical theatre. Raised in Barnet, North London, Paige attended the Aida Foster stage school, making her first professional appearance on stage in 1964, at the age of 16...

, Joan Baez

Joan Baez

Joan Chandos Baez is an American folk singer, songwriter, musician and a prominent activist in the fields of human rights, peace and environmental justice....

, Alison Moyet

Alison Moyet

Alison Moyet , is an English singer, songwriter and performer noted for her bluesy voice.Her UK album sales have reached a certified 2.3 million, with 800,000 singles sold, all in the UK, where all seven of her studio albums and three compilation albums have charted in the Top 40 UK Album Chart,...

, John Denver

John Denver

Henry John Deutschendorf, Jr. , known professionally as John Denver, was an American singer/songwriter, activist, and humanitarian. After growing up in numerous locations with his military family, Denver began his music career in folk music groups in the late 1960s. His greatest commercial success...

, Anúna

Anúna

Anúna is an Irish choral group. In 1987 Dublin composer Michael McGlynn founded An Uaithne, a name which describes the three ancient types of Celtic music, Suantraí , Geantraí and Goltraí . One of the group's stated aims is to explore and redefine this music...

, Loreena McKennitt

Loreena McKennitt

Loreena Isabel Irene McKennitt, CM, OM, is a Canadian singer, composer, harpist, accordionist and pianist who writes, records and performs world music with Celtic and Middle Eastern themes. McKennitt is known for her refined, clear soprano vocals...

, The King's Singers, Eileen Farrell

Eileen Farrell

Eileen Farrell was an American soprano who had a nearly 60 year long career performing both classical and popular music in concerts, theatres, on radio and television, and on disc. While she was active as an opera singer, her concert engagements far outnumbered her theatrical appearances...

, E B A, Hayley Westenra

Hayley Westenra

Hayley Dee Westenra is a New Zealand soprano, classical crossover artist, songwriter and UNICEF Ambassador. Her first internationally released album, Pure, reached No. 1 on the UK classical charts in 2003 and has sold more than two million copies worldwide...

, the Kingston Trio, Kate Miller-Heidke, Bobby Breen

Bobby Breen

Bobby Breen is a Canadian-born actor and singer of the 1930s. He made his professional debut at age four in a night club in Toronto and was an immediate sensation. He made his radio debut soon after. He played in vaudeville and his sister paid for his musical education. Breen went to Hollywood in...

, Chanticleer

Chanticleer

- Fiction :*A rooster appearing in fables about Reynard The Fox**The Nun's Priest's Tale, a version of Chanticleer and the Fox told in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales**By metonymy, any rooster**A character in the movie Rock-a-Doodle played by Glen Campbell...

, and Dinah Shore

Dinah Shore

Dinah Shore was an American singer, actress, and television personality...

, Sufjan Stevens

Sufjan Stevens

Sufjan Stevens is an American singer-songwriter and musician born in Detroit, Michigan. Stevens first began releasing his music on Asthmatic Kitty, a label co-founded with his stepfather, beginning with the 1999 release, A Sun Came...

, among others.

External links

• Free typeset sheet music for voice and SATB from Cantorion.org