Montol Music
At the heart of the Montol festival is the traditional music and dance of Cornish Christmas & Midwinter traditions. These fall into two main categories, The Christmas Carol and the music od Geese dancers.
The Cornish Christmas Carol or "Curl".
Sometimes descibed as Cornwall's gift to Christmas, many of the Christmas Carols we think of as traditional were orginally collected and recorded in Cornwall. Most well known are the collections of Davies "Giddy" Gilbert and William "Uncle Jan Trenoodle" Sandys. Cornwall also has its own rich heritage of composition, the most famous composer of Cornish carol tunes being Thomas Merritt still popular today.
The St Day Carol listen to music or sheet music
The First Nowell listen to music or sheet music
Hark the Glad Sound listen to music
The Seven Joys of Mary listen to music or sheet music
I Saw Three Ships listen to music or sheet music
Lo the Eastern Sages click here for lyrics Thomas Merritt (No music currently available)
For a full list of Cornish Carols click here
The Music of the Geese dancers
Geese dancing largely relied on the popular folk tunes of the time to set there dances to. Below are a list of tunes you will hear during Montol played by the Turkey Rhubarb band and the Golowan band.
Boscastle Breakdown listen to music
Turkey Rhubarb listen to music
Candle Dance listen to music
For a full list of Cornish folk tunes used by the Geese or Guise dancers and others click here