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Our 2014 Christmas Movie: “Away in a Manger”

“Away In a Manger” was our first filmed to include animals, and to be filmed off location of Williamsburg. Although the 2014 Winter would be he warmest on record, on the night of the taping, it was one of the coldest of the season. Using techniques and equipment that was new, it easily came together, and is still our favorite filmed piece.

Did you know?

Away in a Manger is a popular carol throughout the English speaking world. While it’s hard to get an exact ordering of which carols are sung most we have some indication from a 1996 Gallop Poll in Britain which revealed it as the joint second most popular Christmas carol, sharing the spot with O Come All Ye Faithful.

While the precise author of the carol Away in a Manger is unknown, there has been speculation that it could have been written by Martin Luther. This is probably just a myth however, with more evidence pointing towards the carol being authored in the late nineteenth century in the United States. We do know that it’s first appearance was in a book entitled The Little Children’s Book for Schools and Families which appeared in Philadelphia in 1885. This contained much of the modern carol, but excluded the third verse which first appears in a Charles H. Gabriel collection from 1892. This was part of the reason that the Library of Congress’s carol researcher and head of reference section Richard S. Hill concluded that it was probably a Lutheran children’s poem created for the 1883 celebration of Martin Luther’s 400th birthday.

http://carols.net/away-in-a-manger/