Christmas Carols - part 1

What Child Is This?
This melody is the beautiful ‘Greensleeves.’ It dates from Elizabethan time, possibly even earlier. The song was first registered in 1850 to Richard Jones with lyrics that were neither religious nor respectable. Shakespeare mentions it by name in "The Merry Wives of Windsor" in which is it played while traitors are hanged. In 1865 William Chatterton Dix (English) wrote "The Manger Throne", three verses of which became "What Child Is This."
We Three Kings of Orient Are
Frequently thought to be much older than it is, the words and music for this American carol were written in 1857 by John Henry Hopkins as part of a Christmas pageant for the General Theological Seminary in New York City.
Cantique de Noel (O Holy Night)
This carol was written by Adolphe Charles Adam (1803-1856), the French composer best known for his ballet "Giselle." At the time, it was frowned upon by church authorities who denounced it for lack of musical taste and "total absence of the spirit of religion." The French text is by Cappeau de Roquemaure; the English by American clergyman John Sullivan Dwight (1812-1893).