The Topic
In Christmas Eve of 1818, 200 years ago, in a time when people had to live under miserable social and environmental circumstances, in Oberndorf near Salzburg, Austria a sheet of music fell from heaven: „Silent night“.
Joseph Mohr, assistant priest in Oberndorf gave a poem to the assistant organist of the church district and school teacher in the small village of Arnsdorf, Franz Gruber, a poem he had written in 1816.
Mohr asked Gruber to set it to music. Obviously touched by a divine spark, Gruber got to work, giving his completed composition to Mohr the same day. 1818 they gave the world premiere during the Christmas Midnight Mass in Oberndorf.
Neither Mohr nor Gruber could have anticipated that this divine sheet of music, perhaps carried by the breath of the Holy Ghost, would spread over all continents, translated into over 300 languages, that their simple melody would be set, sung, played, and performed thousands upon thousands of times in diverse settings.
The Project
2018 was the 200th year anniversary of the world premiere of Silent Night.
The author, Hans Müller, and the composer, Georg Stampfer, who was also the light designer, traced the origin and the distribution of this phenomenon and wrote a fascinating and touching story in the form of a historical musical.
One can read about the special screening taking place twice in the sold-out cathedral of Maria Saal, Austria. Thousand dots of light and sparkling stars created a firmament under which 20 actors impressively illustrated the creation of the song Silent night.