About This Work
This well-known carol is a version of "Les anges dans nos campagnes" (Angels in our fields), an eighteenth-century French {
oël} with a Latin refrain, from Lorraine or Provence. Although the earliest printed source of this song is Abbé Louis Lambillotte's 1842 collection -Choix de cantiques sur des airs nouveaux, scholars date the melody to the eighteenth century. In fact, as -The New Oxford Book of Carols asserts, since no new newly composed eighteenth-century noël melody is known, Angels We Have Heard on High is probably older. The enchantingly simple melody conjures up an atmosphere of quiet devotion, which is affirmed by the gently expressive legato voices of the Latin {
efrain}. The English text probably stems from James Chadwick's extremely loose translation of the French original. The popular English version, with a somewhat simplified and perhaps less subtle tune, first appeared in -Holy Family Hymns (1860). ~ All Music Guide
