The First Noel
"The First Noel" is another English folk-carol, of Cornish origins specifically. It was first published during the Victorian zest to collect folksongs, in Carols Ancient and Modern (1823) and then in Gilbert and Sandys Carols (1833). Nowell is related to the French word "noel," meaning "Christmas"; thus, the first Christmas. It is another carol in which Jesus' birth is announced to the shepherds out at night tending their sheep by choirs of angels:
The first Nowell the angel did say
Was to certain poor shepherds in fields as they lay;
In fields where they lay, keeping their sheep,
On a cold winter's night that was so deep:
Refrain
Nowell, Nowell, Nowell, Nowell,
Born is the King of Israel.
We had a smaller choir-within-the-choir sing the various verses.