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NEIL DIAMOND CENTRAL

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NEIL DIAMOND CENTRAL WEBSITE - http://www.neildiamondcentral.com/

Jester Hairston was born in Belews Creek, a rural community on the border of Stokes, Forsyth, Rockingham and Guilford counties in North Carolina. His grandparents had been slaves. At an early age, he and his family moved to Homestead, Pennsylvania, just outside Pittsburgh, where he graduated from high school in 1921. Hairston was still a small child when his father died in a job-related accident; he was raised by his grandmother while his mother went to work. While growing up, Hairston heard his grandmother and her friends talking and singing about life on the plantations of the southern US. He listened with immense interest and made a promise to himself that he would preserve this history through music.
This song had its genesis when Hairston was sharing a room with a friend. The friend asked him to write a song for a birthday party. Hairston wrote the song with a calypso rhythm because the people at the party would be mainly West Indians. The song's original title was ‘He Pone and Chocolate Tea’, pone being a type of corn bread. It was never recorded in this form.
Some time later Walter Schumann, at the time conducting Schumann's Hollywood Choir, asked Hairston to write a new Christmas song for his choir. Hairston remembered the calypso rhythm from his old song and wrote new lyrics for it, ‘Mary’s Boy Child’ was born.

MARY'S BOY CHILD (1956)
JESTER HAIRSTON (July 9, 1901-January 18, 2000) 

Long time ago in Bethlehem
So the Holy Bible says
Mary's boy child Jesus Christ
Was born on Christmas Day

Hark, now hear the angels sing
New king's born today
And man will live for evermore
Because of Christmas Day

Now Joseph and his wife, Mary
Came to Bethlehem that night
They found no place to bear the child
Not a single room in sight

By and by they found a little nook
In a stable all forlorn
And in a manger cold and dark
Mary's little boy child was born

Hark, now hear the angels sing
New king's born today
And man will live for evermore
Because of Christmas Day

While shepherds
Watched their flocks by night
They saw a bright new star
And heard the choir from heaven sing
The music seemed to come from afar

Trumpets sound and angels sing
Listen to what they say
That man will live for evermore
Because of Christmas Day
Yes, man will live for evermore
Because of Christmas Day

NEIL DIAMOND – 2016
Album: Acoustic Christmas
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