from Weihnachtslieder Op.8 (1856-1870)

Christbaum

Die Hirten

Die Könige

Christkind

Christmas has its own repertoire and, in a sense, its own composers - composers who, but for pieces performed only at this time of the year, like Augusta Holmès’s Trois anges sont venus ce soir or Victor Hely-Hutchison’s Carol Symphony, would be more or less forgotten. At least as far as this country is concerned, Peter Cornelius is a Christmas composer. Although he is known as the composer of The Barber of Baghdad, all we regularly hear of his is the carol-service favourite, Three kings from Persian lands afar, which is based on Die Könige from his Weihnachtslieder Op.8.

All of them settings of Cornelius’s own words, the Weihnachtslieder vary in ambition from the cosy domesticity of Christbaum, which risks just one departure from the strophic pattern, to the freely composed Die Hirten with its bold modulation in the middle and its shepherds’ horns sounding in the outer sections. Die Könige apparently owes its distinction to Liszt, who suggested that the chorale Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern would make a good accompaniment to Cornelius’s vocal line - which, in the revised version of 1870, it certainly does. Christkind is unpretentious but, in its playful use of minor harmonies, effortlessly captivating.