Do You Hear?

“Do You Hear What I Hear?” is a prayer for peace, written during the Cuban Missile Crisis in mid-October, 1962. The writer, Noel Regney, was in New York, where no one was smiling and many were glued to their radios and television sets for the latest news as the United States and the Soviet Union stood face to face with nuclear disaster hanging in the balance. He saw two mothers with strollers and the babies were smiling at each other. The little ones reminded him of newborn lambs. Thus, the song begins, “Said the night wind to the little lamb….” Regney died in 2002 at the age of 80, leaving behind his Christmas song, wanting the world to know it is a prayer for peace.
The last verse makes that clear: “Pray for peace, people, everywhere, Listen to what I say! The Child, The Child sleeping in the night — He will bring us goodness and light..”
The words seemed to come to him without effort. He asked his wife, Gloria (Shayne Baker), to compose the music, and as she walked down the street in New York it seemed she could hear trumpets playing the melody in her head. When they played and sang the song, thinking of the babies and the very real threat of nuclear disaster, they broke down and cried.

Read Noel and Gloria’s story and see the words to the song here. His World War II experiences shaped his desire for peace.
If you are like I am, you thought this song had been around long before 1962. It made a place for itself immediately upon publication, being recorded by Bing Crosby and many others.