Advent Calendar 2010 - December 22nd : Good king Wenceslas

Advent Calendar 2010

December 22nd - Good King Wenceslas

by Sissel Marie Vatne, 22.12.2010

The story of duke Wenceslas of Bohemia is on the programme today, through the carol Good King Wenceslas, performed by Royal Choral Society under the direction of Malcolm Sargent.

Music recording in the early days

Sir Malcolm Sargent started recording early. His first recording was extracts from Vaughan Williams’ opera Hugh the Drove, which was recorded in 1923. In an interview with Gramophone in 1955, he described how recordings were made back in the days:

"We could hardly breathe, I remember. There was the fantastic occasion when we did Vaughan Williams's Hugh the Drover. We were all crammed into one tiny room with our coats and waistcoats off owing to the hothouse temperature. This was necessary to keep the recording wax at the right consistency. Two big recording horns projected into the studio through gaps in the wall. On the other side of the wall were the recording machines. The sound went down the horns to the needle and straight on to the wax. It was all very simple. And terrifying.

"We were so cramped that I had to stand on a shelf, strapped to the wall so as not to fall off. While conducting with my right hand I kept my left hand- on the soprano's head, pushing her towards the recording horn on low notes and drawing her back from it on high ones, to avoid blast. Most of the singers took their places in turn at one horn or the other, squeezing their way round the orchestral players, who were packed like sardines in a box. For one of his entries the baritone had to crawl under the violinists' elbows, 'surface' just in front of the horn, then bob down and crawl back.

Good King Wenceslas

It’s not Vaughan Williams we’re going to hear today, but the carol Good King Wenceslas. The carol is not as well-known in Norway as in Britain, but the carol still has a Scandinavian connection. The tune of the carol comes from the Finnish-Swedish collection of medieval hymns, Piae Cantiones, published in 1582. The orginal text is a spring carol, titled Tempus Adest Floridum (It is time for flowering).

The carol tells the story of Saint Wenceslaus I, Duke of Bohemia (ca 903-935), who is said to have gone out to give alms on St. Stephens Day (Dec. 26). When his page started struggling in the snow and cold weather, he was able to continue the good deed by warming himself on heat from the king’s footprints in the snow.

Wenceslaus was killed in a struggle for the crown, and thus he was never really a king. He was later declared a martyr and venerated as Saint Wenceslaus, and is the patron saint of the Czech Republic.

For those who are in the mood for some visual holiday spirit, the story of Good King Wenceslas was made into a movie in 1994, starring Jonathan Brandis from The Neverending Story 2, and Joan Fontaine from Hitchcock’s Rebecca.