Britten’s Ceremony of Carols

A Ceremony of Carols, Op. 28, is an extended choral composition for Christmas by Benjamin Britten scored for three-part treble chorus, solo voices, and harp. The text, structured in eleven movements, is taken from The English Galaxy of Shorter Poems. It is principally in Middle English, with some Latin and Early Modern English. It was composed in 1942 on Britten’s sea voyage from the United States to England.