Welcome aboard the World Express, our musical journey through Europe and beyond.
This time the World Express train arrives in Germany for Christmas and visits Ernst Mosch and the Original Egerländer Musikanten in a small Baroque church playing an instrumental version of the Christmas carol “O Du Fröhliche, O Du Selige.”
The melody of this German Christmas carol is taken from the traditional Catholic Marian hymn "O Sanctissima" (Oh Most Holy) which is more familar to English speaking listeners as the music to the contemporary Marian hymn “Mary, Full of Grace”:
Mary, full of grace,
Splendor of our race,
Holy Virgin Maria!
Pray for us to Christ, your Son,
Now and when our life is done!
Ora, ora pro nobis! (Pray, pray for us!)
Mother, Virgin pure,
Hope and refuge sure,
Lead us safely to Jesus!
Spirit filled and lowly,
Mirror of the Holy!
Ora, ora pro nobis! (Pray, pray for us!)
Ernst Mosch, a Sudenten German, was born in the small market town of Svatava, Czecholslovakia in 1925. It was a family tradition in the area where he lived that each family raise at least one musician. Ernst wanted to pursue this artistic tradition and he studied music at a private youth music school, and after working as an aircraft mechanic, he applied to and was accepted at the municipal music school in in Oelsnitz / Vogtland, Saxony in Germany. During WWII, Ernst Moch became a military musician in the Wermacht.
After WWII, Mosch performed with various German bands and orchestras at American GI Military clubs in Landsberg, Hamburg, and Munich. Mosch founded his brass band Die Egerländer Musikanten in 1956, which, as the result of a radio broadcast in Stuttgart, achieved commercial success and a record contract.
Mosch renamed the brass band the Original Egerländer Musikanten in 1958, and it became the first German band ever to perform at Carnegie Hall in New York City in 1966. Mosch was awarded the Hermann Löns Gold Medal in Munich, the highest German award for folk musicians.
Ernst Mosch passed away in 1999. His records sold more than 40 million copies worldwide and include six gold and platinum selling records.
Merry Christmas!
Und Fröhliche Weihnachten!
