Sally DeFord Music
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While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks By Night

MP3 Recording (performed as a duet) featuring vocals by Heather Prusse :   Hi-speed    Dialup    Download
MP3 accompaniment track :   Hi-speed    Dialup    Download

MP3 Choral Recording performed by the Latter Day Singers :   Hi-speed    Dialup

View/print sheet music:     SATB

    Traditional tune with lyrics by Nahum Tate. Arrangement and additional lyrics by Sally DeFord.

    One Christmas as our congregation sang "While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks by Night," I wondered why this long-familiar carol had never been one of my favorites. It has great words (in what other song do you get to sing "seraph" and "forthwith" in the same line?) and the melody suits the lyrics well, but... ho hum. As Marianne Dashwood so aptly put it, "...there is a something wanting."

    So I played around with it, and found that it readily fell into 6/8 meter. At a quick tempo, with a flute intro and obbligato for the last verse, it passed the "fun" test: my husband whistled it for a week.

    Heather's demo for this song is of the "don't try this at home" variety--or rather, don't try this alone. She's the soprano... and the alto. Obviously you'll need two voices for a live presentation. The harmonies she sings are adapted from the SATB score.

      Lyrics:

      While shepherds watched their flocks by night all seated on the ground
      The angel of the Lord came down and glory shone around
      "Fear not!" said he, for mighty dread had seized their troubled mind
      "Good tidings of great joy I bring to you and all mankind."

      "To you in David's town this day is born of David's line
      A Savior who is Christ the Lord, and this shall be the sign
      The heavenly Babe you there shall find, to human view displayed
      All meanly wrapped in swathing bands and in a manger laid."

      Thus spake the seraph and forthwith appeared a shining throng
      Of angels, praising God, who thus addressed their joyful song
      "All glory be to God on high, and on the earth be peace,
      Good will henceforth from heav'n to man begin and never cease."

      Then with all haste the shepherds came to see the wondrous sight
      Amid the strains of heav'nly praise that lingered on the night
      "All glory be to God on high, and on the earth be peace,
      Good will henceforth from heav'n to man begin and never cease."