Ring out, Wild Bells

Sheet Music

Using arr. from the Kyrie in the “Twelfth Mass,” attributed to Mozart

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• LilyPond
• Copyright: Public Domain
• Contributer: Veramet 20:27, 2 January 2008 (MST)
• Notes: There has been a slight modification so that the in the first phrase of the first verse is not accented (this change has also been released to the public domain—though I might say it's not enough to copyright: Veramet 20:29, 2 January 2008 (MST)).

Tunes

• Marsden, by Crawford Gates (b. 1921)—written specifically for Ring Out, Wild Bells.
  • Copyright: © 1948 IRI
• Tune by W. W. Gilchrist as seen in First and Second Book in Vocal Music, 1901 (p. 48)
• Tune by Mendelssohn as seen in The Life Hymnal: A Book of Song and Service for the Sunday School, 1904 (no. 64)
• Arr. from the Kyrie in the “Twelfth Mass,” attributed to Mozart—Tune from The Hymnal, by United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A., 1911 (no. 647)
• A setting by Gounod (also it was once transcribed for the organ by Frank West)
  • Copyright: This setting has yet to be found published (although it is mentioned in a public domain book) and so the copyright may be unknown.
• Waltham by John Baptiste Calkin (1827–1905), 1872

Lyrics

• Poet: Alfred Tennyson (1809–1892), 1850
• Copyright: Public Domain

Lyrics from The Cambridge Book of Poetry and Song, 1910 (p. 576)

1. Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

2. Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

3. Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more:
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

4. Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife:
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

5. Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times:
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes,
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

6. Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite:
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

7. Ring out old shapes of foul disease:
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold:
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

8. Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.