Whence Is That Goodly Fragrance Flowing?

On the Sunday before Christmas, it has become my custom to play a 30-minute prelude on the piano in our chapel before the start of church. The music, consisting of sacred carols from different countries, varies from year to year. A short printed program, providing some background information on each piece, is placed in the pews, and reverence is given renewed emphasis. 

One of the pieces I played this past Christmas was Whence Is That Goodly Fragrance Flowing? a 17th century French carol about the Nativity of Christ and the calling of the shepherds to Bethlehem. It begins with this verse:

Whence is that goodly fragrance flowing,
Stealing our senses all away?
Never the like did come a-blowing,
Shepherds, from flow’ry fields in May.
Whence is that goodly fragrance flowing,
Stealing our senses all away?[1]

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