OT Advent Calendar (& Hanukkah!) Day 6: Dreidel

Advent has always been my favorite time of year. Not only does it lead up to the festival of Christmas, but my birthday falls right around half way through. What’s more, I grew up in snowy Central New York—that’s the barren hinterlands of Upstate, for those in the city so nice they named it twice—and if I didn’t get a White Christmas, the Great Lakes were good for a storm around my birthday so there’d at least be a good beginning to the winter.

Advent is far from an untouched subject around these parts, so I’m clearly not alone.

Your OT Advent Calendar this year will be musical. We’ll talk about diamond-in-the-rough traditional tunes just waiting for renewed popularity, crimes against Christmas, the silly songs and the songs that have become modern traditions. We’ll also talk about the notion of true Christmas Carols, those which address the twelve days festival beginning on Christmas itself, including not just the one day-counting song but another. 

Let’s dive in, shall we?

Today’s tunes are “Here We Come a-Wassailing” and “I Have a Little Dreidel”

Another straightforward wassailing song about wassailing, “Here We Come a’Wassailing” is another classic of the genre; its lyric combines the cidering, blessing and favor-begging nature of the tradition neatly.

Here is the version recorded by The Watersons and the lyrics therefrom:

Here we come a-wassailing among the leaves so green,
Here we come a-wandering so fairly to be seen,
Now is winter-time strangers travel far and near,
And we wish you, send you a happy New Year.

Bud and blossom, bud and blossom, bud and bloom and bear,
So we may have plenty of cider all next year;
Apples are in capfuls are in bushel bags and all,
And there’s cider running out of every gutter hole.

Down here in the muddy lane there sits an old red fox,
Starving and a-shivering and licking his old chops;
Bring us out your table and spread it if you please,
And give us hungry wassailers a bit of bread and cheese.

I’ve got a little purse and it’s made of leather skin,
A little silver sixpence it would line it well within;
Now is winter-time; strangers travel far and near,
And we wish you, send you a happy New Year.

For those who would appreciate a bluegrass instrumental version, there is this:

Today is also the sixth night of Hanukkah. I’ll turn it over to my great friend Cantor Jessica Epstein of Temple B’nai Abraham in Livingston, New Jersey.

This song is the classic of all classic Hannukah songs and taught to children as young as two years old to sing. It is not, however, a true folksong; this song was composed by Shmuel Eliezer Goldfarb (the brother of famous rabbi and composer, Israel Goldfarb) who served as the Director of the Music Education Ministry on the Jewish Education Council in New York. This gave Shmuel the opportunity to promote the teaching of music in local schools. The two musical brothers collaborated to promote the teaching of Jewish music and from 1918 to 1929 they published books and pamphlets that compiled different songs to use for various holidays and occasions.

Video here of a really cute acapella version from Duke’s Duke Rhythm and Blue group, December 2015.

For more on the brothers and their musical legacy, which has been rediscovered, click here.