"It Came Upon the Midnight Clear" is a poem and Christmas carol written by Edmund Sears, pastor of the Unitarian Church in Weston, Massachusetts. It first appeared on December 29, 1849 in the Christian Register in Boston.
Sears is said to have written these words at the request of his friend, W. P. Lunt, a minister in Quincy, Massachusetts. In 1850 Richard Storrs Willis, a composer who trained under Felix Mendelssohn, wrote the melody called "Carol". "Carol" is the most widely-known tune to the song in the USA. In the UK the tune called "Noel", which was adapted from an English melody in 1874 by Arthur Sullivan, is the usual accompaniment.
In 1981, Swedish dansband singer Stefan Borsch covered the song in Swedish, as "Jag ser en stjrna p himmelen" ("I see a star in the sky").
In 2003, a recording of the song by Sixpence None the Richer was released on the Christmas compilation album,.
Download this sheet!