The Little Drummer Boy
| "The Little Drummer Boy" | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Single by Harry Simeone Chorale | |
| B-side | "Die Lorelei" (20th Fox) "O' Holy Night" (20th Century-Fox) "Hallelujah" (Kapp) "O' Bambino (One Cold and Blessed Winter)" (Kapp Winners Circle; MCA) |
| Released | October 19, 1958 |
| Format | 7-inch |
| Genre | Christmas, Pop |
| Length | 3:03 |
| Label |
20th Fox 45-121 20th Century-Fox 429 20th Century-Fox 6429 Kapp 711 Kapp Winners Circle 86 MCA 65030 |
| Writer(s) |
Harry Simeone K.K. Davis Henry Onorati |
"The Little Drummer Boy" (originally known as "Carol of the Drum") is a popular Christmas song written by the American classical music composer and teacher Katherine Kennicott Davis in 1941. It was recorded in 1951 by the Trapp Family Singers and realised on the choir's first LP Christmas with the Trapp Family Singers and released as a single (45rpm). These were the first recordings released on their new record label Decca Records and further popularized by a 1958 recording by the Harry Simeone Chorale. This version was re-released successfully for several years and the song has been recorded many times since.
In the lyrics the singer relates how, as a poor young boy, he was summoned by the Magi to the nativity where, without a gift for the infant Jesus, he played his drum with the Virgin Mary's approval, remembering "I played my best for Him" and "He smiled at me."
The song was originally titled "Carol of the Drum" and was published by Davis as based upon a traditional Czech carol. Davis's interest was in producing material for amateur and girls' choirs: Her manuscript is set as a chorale, in which the tune is in the soprano melody with alto harmony, tenor and bass parts producing the "drum rhythm" and a keyboard accompaniment "for rehearsal only". It is headed "Czech Carol freely transcribed by K.K.D", these initials then deleted and replaced with "C.R.W. Robinson", a name under which Davis sometimes published. The Czech original of the carol has never been identified.
"Carol of the Drum" appealed to the Austrian Trapp Family Singers, who first brought the song to wider prominence when they recorded it for Decca Records in 1955, shortly before they retired: their version was credited solely to Davis and published by Belwin-Mills. In 1957 it was recorded, with a slightly altered arrangement, by the Jack Halloran Singers for their album Christmas Is A-Comin' on Dot Records. Dot's Henry Onorati introduced the song to his friend Harry Simeone and the following year, when 20th Century Fox Records contracted him to make a Christmas album, Simeone, making further small changes to the Halloran arrangement and retitling it "The Little Drummer Boy", recorded it with the Harry Simeone Chorale on the album Sing We Now of Christmas. Simeone and Onorati claimed joint composition credits with Davis.
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