Saturday 25 December 2021
Tune of the Day: Joy to the World
arranged for three flutes
“Joy to the World” is a carol that hardly needs any presentation. The hymn was originally written in 1719, but it was initially sung to tunes entirely unrelated to the one commonly used today. This first appeared in Lowell Mason's 1836 book Occasional Psalm and Hymn Tunes, where it was given the name “Antioch” and attributed as being “From Handel”. Any resemblances between Handel's works (particularly the Messiah) and “Joy to the World”, however, have been dismissed as “chance resemblance” by modern scholars, who rather tend to explain this attribution by Mason's well-known admiration of Handel's work.
Many thanks to Mark for contributing this arrangement for three flutes, and a very merry Christmas to all!