Let’s stay around the same time period as yesterday’s
piece, but move to the Mediterranean area for our Christmas music today.
Pietro Yon wrote “Gesu Bambino” in 1917. Imagine the
drive to pull yourself figuratively out of the fourth year of a war that was
strangling Italy (and France, and Germany, and Russia, and Britain…) to write a
carol about angels and shepherds rejoicing over the birth of the Savior.
I like the way the melody ripples in a swirling
pattern, like water bubbling down a hillside. As per usual, it’s about the baby
Jesus (well—that is the title, after
all), to whom it refers as “The Christmas Rose”, which is kind of pretty.
I love the refrain:
Osanna, osanna cantaro
Con giubilante cor
I tuoi pastori ed angeli
O re di luce e amor
Your shepherds and angels sang hosanna, hosanna with
jubilant heart, O king of light and love.
And here are two of my favorite sopranos singing it at
Carnegie Hall:
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