Carol of the Bells is a song that has been a favorite of mine for many years. I’ve sort of been known for performing it around Christmas time as well, and so when I was writing music for my “Winter Symphony” album, I knew I wanted to include this song.
I wanted it to be a very cinematic version of the music, and so it’s with great pride that this music video turned out as beautiful as it did – because I feel that it fits the music so well. This music video features the beautiful and talented 16 year old Carolynne May Guinup as the ballerina. She endured some very cold weather dancing through the forest of the Olympic Peninsula in Washington in the month of November. Give her a thumbs up for that!
And YES, we did haul a real antique grand piano into the forest as well! Someone asked if it was “photoshopped”. No, indeed not.
MUSIC CREDITS
“Carol of the Bells”
Music by Mykola Leontovych
Arranged by Jennifer Thomas
Orchestrated by Glen Gabriel
Piano performed by Jennifer Thomas
Orchestra performed by players from the Utah Symphony and the Salt Lake Pops Orchestra
Mixed by Brian Vibberts
Mastered by Christofer Stannow
FILM PRODUCTION CREDITS
Jennifer Thomas – Pianist
Carolynne May Guinup – Ballerina
Ryan K. McNeal – Director
Tel Stewart – Cinematographer
Alex “Splice” Jones – Editor
Will Thomas – Drone Pilot
Kimberly Starkey – Production Assistant
Noelle McBride – Hair/Makeup (The Moore Theater scenes)
Thank you to:
Urban Grace Church (Ballet studio scenes), Tacoma, WA
The Moore Theater, Seattle, WA and the stage crew
Ballet costumes – Erin Ceragioli and Tacoma City Ballet
Jennifer’s tulle skirt – by IBCBoutique on Etsy
Debra Heesch (The Paramount Theater) for helping us get the Moore Theater
Ron Southworth (my dad) for helping us haul a 1,000 pound antique grand piano through the forest.
Carolyn Southworth (my mom) for watching our cute kiddos while we filmed.
“Shchedryk”, колядка “Щедрик”, kolyadka, Ukrainian New Year’s song / Carol of the Bells
“The Little Swallow” Ukrainian folk song was arranged by composer Mykola Leontovich in 1916, and tells a story of a swallow flying into a household to sing of wealth that will come with the following spring. “Shchedryk” was adapted as an English Christmas carol, well-known “Carol of the Bells”, by Peter J. Wilhousky in 1936. “Carol of the Bells” and “Shchedryk” share the same melody /by composer Mykola Leontovich/ but these two songs have different lyrics.
“Bountiful evening, a New Year’s carol;
A little swallow flew into the household
and started to twitter, to summon the master:
“Come out, master, look at the sheep pen,
there the ewes have given birth and the lambkins have been born
Your goods are great, you will have a lot of money, by selling them.
If not money, then chaff from all the grain you will harvest
