Healing in his wings

As we round the corner into the last week before Christmas, let’s pull out all the stops. I’m talking Charles Wesley, Felix Mendelssohn and King’s College, Cambridge.

One tradition of the fourth Sunday in Advent focuses on angels, so it seems appropriate to have one of the all-time barnburners of Christmas carols, “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing”. This one, particularly with David Willcocks’ descant.

Wesley wrote his “Hymn for Christmas Day” in 1739. He envisioned it being set to solemn and slow music, but fortunately someone in the 19^th Century hooked it up with Mendelssohn’s “Vaterland, in dinen Gauen”.

Crank up the volume and feel free to sing along.