O Holy Night (with Maria Campbell)

Описание: Back by popular demand is Maria Campbell, a fantastic singer and my first cousin on Pap's side. During our Christmas live stream, quite a few Acorns requested this beautiful Christmas song, but I knew I couldn't do it justice. Luckily, I knew someone who could do much more than that! Maria and I did this song together in the Martins Creek School gym back in December of 2023, just weeks before my retirement. That performance, which was part of the school-wide Christmas program, was in front of the entire school, and my nerves made me get the song too fast and also made me insert far too many guitar runs! I placed a link to that video below for comparison. Maria and I come in at 7:06 in that video/program. It's hard to believe, but Maria's singing has gotten even better since then! Making it even harder to believe is the fact that she just got over pneumonia! :-)
In a previous post, I shared the background info on this timeless song. Here it is again for anyone who missed it:

The song is based on the poem Minuit, Chrétiens written by Placide Cappeau in 1843. Cappeau was a wine merchant and part-time poet from Roquemaure, France. He wrote the poem to celebrate the renovation of the stained glass in his local church. :-) The music was composed by Adolphe Adam, a French composer. John Sullivan Dwight, an American writer, created the standard English translation of the song in 1855. Dwight made slight changes to the third verse, inspired by the lyrics about Christ's victory over sin. The song was first performed at a midnight mass on Christmas Eve in 1847. Cool fact: In 1906, Reginald Fessenden, a university professor and former chief chemist for Thomas Edison, broadcast "O Holy Night" over the radio, becoming the first song to be sent through the airwaves! The song was used in the anti-slavery movement in America. Many artists have covered the song, including Doyle Dykes, Mariah Carey, Josh Groban, Celine Dion, and Andrea Bocelli.
When I was a kid, a sweet lady named Sandra Chastain used to sing this song around Christmas time. It always made me frozen with attention. She's now elderly and doesn't sing anymore, at least not solos. I have no video or recording of her singing it, only a memory. As far as I know, I place Maria's singing of this song right up there with anyone who ever sang it! Charlotte Church also had a beautiful performance of it. It's no easy song to sing, or play for that matter (since the timing is unusual). There's no doubt who has the best instrumental version/performance, and that's Doyle Dykes. I placed a link to Doyle performing the song at Shadow Mountain Church last year. Doyle says he has played the song much better on other occasions, and I'm sure he's correct, but I absolutely love this performance because of the stage presence, the background, the light glinting off his guitar in alignment with his core/heart. I downloaded that performance from Shadow Mountain's channel and uploaded it as an unlisted video for our Acorns. Hopefully, neither they nor Doyle will mind me doing so. I could have shared a link to the entire church service, but it might have been hard for some viewers to find the song within a much longer video.
When the great David Jeremiah, pastor of Shadow Mountain Church, comes to the pulpit after Doyle's performance, he says, "Chet Atkins was right." He makes that comment because in his introduction of Doyle, the music director of Shadow Mt. quoted Mr. Atkins as saying that Doyle is the greatest finger-style guitar player. Mr. Jeremiah also referred to Doyle's guitar as being a Taylor. While the guitar Doyle used to play O Holy Night in this clip was actually a Gibson (given to him by Chet Atkins), Doyle did play his signature model Taylor guitar in another part of the church service. Mr. Jeremiah was proud of the fact that Taylor Guitars are made not far from the church. :-)
I hope you enjoyed this Christmas song with Maria and that you enjoy all the videos linked below. Thanks for watching!

2023 School Performance with Maria:    • MCS Christmas Caroling Assembly 2022  

Doyle Dykes at Shadow Mt. 2024:    • O Holy Night (Doyle Dykes, San Diego, CA 2...  

Listen to original singles released on Spotify:
https://open.spotify.com/artist/5VX6Z...

Listen to original singles on YouTube:
   / @paulwilson6260  

Listen to Shepherd of My Soul (Album released in 2016):
https://open.spotify.com/album/4VnoOy...