Angels We Have Heard on High

“Angels We Have Heard on High” is James Chadwick’s 1862 English paraphrase of the French carol “Les Anges dans nos campagnes.” Chadwick, born in Drogheda, was the Catholic bishop of Hexham and Newcastle. The French carol, by an unknown author, was first printed in 1805 in a book of carols by Père Roche, as “J’entends là sur ces collines,” and with words and music under its familiar title in 1842. The words tell of the shepherds outside Bethlehem meeting the angels, as in Luke’s gospel. It is sung to “Gloria,” a traditional French melody arranged by Edward Shippen Barnes, whose refrain stretches the first syllable of “Gloria” across sixteen notes. In Britain the same French tune is better known as “Angels from the Realms of Glory.”