While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks By Night - on Ilkla Moor?

A fascinating package on the early part of Today on Radio 4 this morning.

According to hymnologist Jeremy Dibble , the carol ‘While shepherds watched’ was the first to cross over to the Church of England from the secular, folk tradition, and the tune used in most church services today is just one of many variations used over the 300-year history of the carol,.

During his research as Musical Editor of the forthcoming "Dictionary of Hymnology", Prof Dibble found that ‘While shepherds watched’ became a central hymn for English-speaking Protestants following its appearance in 1700 when it was published as one of sixteen hymns in ‘the Supplement’ by Nahum Tate and Nicholas Brady in the New Version of the Psalms of David.
These versions supplanted the Old Version by Sternhold and Hopkins. Some people refer to the tune as being written by Tate and Brady but there is no evidence that it was actually composed by them.

Prof Dibble said: 'While shepherds watched’ was the first carol to cross over from secular traditions to the church. It was the only Christmas hymn to be approved by the Church of England in the eighteenth century and this allowed it to be disseminated across the country with the Book of Common Prayer. Only at the end of the eighteenth century was it joined by other well-known texts such as ‘Hark the herald angels sing’.'

He said the most surprising and rather forgotten version of ‘While shepherds watched’ is sung to the Methodist hymn tune 'Cranbrook' [Tune V] composed by shoemaker Thomas Clark in 1805. And it was this tune that was appropriated as the unofficial Yorkshire anthem 'On Ilkley Moor Baht ’at'

Unfortunately most of the press surrounding this story seem to present the facts the other way round - that the carol was set to the tune of 'Ilkley Moor'.

A recording of the carol can be found on the BBC News website and a YouTube clip here.