Silent Night: The Song and Its Story (2024)

I love this book; the story of the Austrian Silent Night song, originally in German. The images are regal and the story is endearing.

In the spoiler I posted the super easy sheet music, from the last page at the end of the book. ["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>["br"]>

This is a phenomenal retelling of how the classic Christmas carol, Silent Night, came to be. Though full of facts, it is masterfully told in story-form. The music and it's lyrics take on strong meaning when you know the history of their creation. I highly recommend reading this book!

Ages: 5 - 12

Cleanliness: nothing to note.

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Author Margaret Hodges and illustrator Tim Ladwig join forces in this picture-book history of one of the world's most beloved Christmas carols. Written by Austrian priest Joseph Mohr on Christmas Eve, 1818, when his church's organ broke down, thereby threatening the music that made such an integral part of their congregation's Christmas Eve mass, the words of the song were paired with a tune composed by church organist Franz Gruber. The origin of the song was forgotten for a time, but it was popularized by an Austrian family who sang it at a fair in Leipzig, leading to its inclusion in a small book entitled Four Songs of the Tyrol... Sung by the Strasser Family of the Ziller Valley. It eventually caught the attention of King Frederick William IV of Prussia, who had it sung every Christmas by his Cathedral Choir, and whose curiosity about its origins led to its true authorship being revealed. It was brought to America by another singing family of the Ziller Valley, and was first translated into English in 1863, by John Freeman Young. It went on to be translated into many languages, to be sung at key moments in various conflicts, including the 1914 Christmas Truce during World War I, and remains a most popular Christmas carol today...

I found

A fascinating and very thorough book. It's main section is the story of the origins of the hymn. When that was over I was pleasantly surprised to see that it then detailed what happened next...how it became such a beloved Christmas song around the world. Beautiful illustrations. A recommended read for the holiday season.

Though humble in its beginning, the song "Silent Night" has become an inspiration to people all over the world. This book tells how the carol came to be and how it has brought a spirit of love and peace in many circ*mstances. The illustrations were beautiful, also.

Silent Night: The Song and Its Story is a children's picture book written by Margaret Hodges and illustrated by Tim Ladwig. It is a book retelling the story about the creation of one of the most popular Christmas carols.

Hodges' text is simplistic, straightforward, and rather poetic. It recounts the creation of Silent Night rather well and how its message of hope and peace influenced many around the world. Ladwig's illustrations are wonderfully drawn and beautifully rendered.

The premise of the book is rather straightforward. It is a story about Joseph Mohr, an Austrian Roman Catholic priest, and Franz Xaver Gruber, a primary school teacher and church organist, combined their talents to create one of the most memorable Christmas carol ever penned.

All in all, Silent Night: The Song and Its Story is a wonderfully Christmas picture book about the creation and legacies of one of the season's popular carols – Silent Night.

This book is about the production of the famous Christmas song "silent night". It starts will a choir practicing for their Christmas eve service but suddenly, the organ becomes broken. Father Mohr has to make a quick fix and writes a song as simple as the birth of christ is. With his choir and his guitar, Father Mohr played the first "silent night" and it was heard for the first time. The people that attended the service in a little town in Austria loved the song and begged that he would play it for every christmas eve service. Soon the song was making it's way across Europe and the globe. Soldiers were having truces' while singing the song, and people were singing it outside their shops so that people would come in. This is such a sweet Christmas time book that would surely be a hit among students that are interested in music. Super fun for most ages as well!

Silent Night tells the story of the writing of "Silent Night." An Austrian church's organ broke and the town though there would be no music for Christmas. The priest of the church surprised everyone by writing a new song. The story then tells of how the song traveled around the world.

I loved this book! I did not know the story behind the song and it was very interesting and included very heart-warming anecdotes.

I would use this when talking about the holiday season in an elementary school.

Library find. Loved this. There's just something about the story of a broken organ, a simple guitar, and an Austrian village. The beautiful illustrations are worthy of the story.

Interesting to contrast with the lovely T.C. Christensen movie "Silent Night." (I'm gonna guess it was really a children's choir rather than the movie's touching assemblage of town drunks.)

As far as my little critic goes, he sat patiently through this, but I don't expect him to ask for it again. He did get a little excited when he realized "those people are real."

Because this reads like an interesting story, it took several pages for me children to realize that it was a true one, and they enjoyed learning the history of this beloved Christmas song. It did make me wish it came with a CD full of different versions of it - 2 men with a guitar and a boys choir joining in on the last two lines, a quartet of siblings, and an old church full of singing congregants could make up the playlist, just as described in the book.

The historical story of a beautiful song is perfectly captured and shared through this wonderful children's picture book. Anyone who loves Christmas and the power of this song should read this story. I thought the war stories of this song inspiring peace and humanity across nationalities and disagreements was a great way to close the book as well.

A nice history of how Silent Night came to be. I love how it traces the origins and moves through the transitions through various families and towns. I love how it gave concrete examples of how it has made a difference through various countries and cultures.

Like the "Luther" kids book that tells an excellent and condensed version of the reformer's life, this book keeps our kids coming back time and again to hear a not-so-short-story account of how this beloved song came to be. It was great!

A lovely illustrated story about the origin and spread of the carol Silent Night. Includes the music in the back.

#cbad 2018-2019 - 5th grade SCA - 12/18/18 - average rating 4.7

I love this song and the illustrations are beautiful. This book is on the longer side for a picture book, but would be great for an older child.

Fascinating story of the origin and spread of “silent night “

I had no idea the history of this song. Beautifully illustrated and told.

Let Us Wait for Light & Miracles

The story of the Christmas song "Silent Night"

Loved this book! Made me cry.

Beautiful story with incredible illustrations. This book is about the song Silent Night and how it came to be. It all started one night in a small church when the organ went out. A man by the name of Joseph Mohr wrote the beautiful lyrics and had a man named Franz Gruber write the accompanying sound. Over the years the song was distributed through different villages and sang during Christmas time. The man who wrote it never even knew how known it had become. This book can be incorporated in the class as a story too read during Christmas time.

I found this book quite accidentally on display at work the other day and sat down to read it today. A stunning picture book about the origin of the beloved Christmas carol Stille Nacht, or "Silent Night," in the hills of Oberndorf, Austria. The book also illustrates how the song was spread and translated across the world, and shared even in the midst of war.

I've never seen a picture book that captures the original story before, but it's a beautiful story and the accompanying illustrations are very pretty. It was originally published in 1997 so unfortunately, it's also out of print, and probably becoming scarce even at libraries (the one I found is the only copy in my library system). But if you enjoy religious Christmas stories, this is definitely a book to try to get your hands on and share at least once.

This is a wonderful story that explains the origins of the classic Christmas song "Silent Night." The story is interesting and we all learned a lot about the way this song became a Christmas favorite throughout the world.

The illustrations are terrific and complement the story nicely. We really enjoyed reading this book together and we've read it a couple of times.

Picked this up at the library and it is a lovely story about the origins of the carol. I should note that it is a bit long/dense to read out loud if your throat is dry and tired. :) It got distracting because it talked about soldiers and prisoners of war singing the song and JP had questions about all of that business that sort of derailed the end of the book. But a good story, nonetheless.

Sweetly told story of the origins of the carol "Silent Night."

I didn't know that Silent Night was a song.

Read it to my 5 year old. I probably should have spread it over 2 nights, as she was interested at first but trailed off a bit mid way through. Still, a nice children's book.

This story, explains in delightful detail how one of the most beautiful Christmas carols, Silent Night, came to be.

The book is very sweet and the pictures are exquisite!

A more complete history of this hymn than other picture books--longer, but worthwhile.