Description

Voicing: SATB choir, SA soli, & piano

 

duration: 4 minutes

 

This arrangement is a wonderful fit for choirs looking to showcase their excellent soprano and alto soloists. The choir part comes together quickly, for it is simple and repetitive, but it also highlights and amplifies the climax of the work.

 

View the perusal score here.

 

level: 3

 

Text

 

Bethlehem

 

There stands a church in Bethlehem today,

Built where the baby in the manger lay,

Where Mary touched and kissed his little face;

A place of pilgrimage, a holy place.

 

O holy Jesus, Everlasting Light,

Let there be peace in Bethlehem tonight.

 

And once, in better times, I travelled there,

Watched children run around in Manger Square,

Then went into the church’s crypt and stood

Before the birthplace of the Son of God.

 

O holy Jesus, Everlasting Light,

Let there be peace in Bethlehem tonight.

 

Now in the little town where Christ was born,

Young men and children die, and mothers mourn.

Wise men have not brought peace to Manger Square.

O hear us as we offer up this prayer:

 

O holy Jesus, Everlasting Light,

Let there be peace in Bethlehem tonight.

 

 

~ Wendy Cope, Christmas Poems (2007), published by Faber & Faber