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Every Christmas Eve deserves to be enlivened not only with Christmas carols but also popular songs as part of a whole
range of religious hymns. A number of them were collected by Ernest Gagnon who was one of the first in Quebec to be
interested in this field. His collection of songs was published in 1897 and again in 1906 as Cantiques populaires du
Canada français (Popular Songs of French Canada). Apart from religious songs, ancient noels like D’où viens-tu, bergère? were also sung. Ernest Myrand published a volume of these under the title, Noëls anciens de la Nouvelle-France (Ancient Noels of New France). |
From old French noels through American Christmas carols of which White Christmas as popularized by Bing Crosby is the most famous example, we come to more recent popular songs like Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, Petit papa Noël and Jingle Bells among others. And even though not traditional Christmas songs, other folk songs, drinking songs or rounds also made up the repertoire of parties during the holiday period.
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