The song had its genesis when Hairston was sharing a room with a friend. The friend asked him to write a song for a birthday party.[7] Hairston wrote the song with a calypso rhythm because the people at the party would be mainly West Indians. The song's original title was "He Pone and Chocolate Tea", pone being a type of corn bread.[7] It was never recorded in this form.
Some time later Walter Schumann, at the time conducting Schumann's Hollywood Choir, asked Hairston to write a new Christmas song for his choir. Hairston remembered the calypso rhythm from his old song and wrote new lyrics for it.[7]
Harry Belafonte heard the song being performed by the choir and sought permission to record it.[7] It was recorded in 1956[1] and released as a single that year.[5] Belafonte released it again the following year in 1957 on his album An Evening with Belafonte, using a different, longer take.[4][5] This longer version was also released in the UK as a single[8] (with a B-side of "Eden Was Just Like This"),[9] where it became the first UK number one to have a playing time of over four minutes.[10] It reached No. 1 on the UK Singles Chart in November 1957,[6][8][10] and has since sold over 1.19 million copies there.[11]
In 1962, the full-length version was also added to a re-issue of Belafonte's previously released album To Wish You a Merry Christmas. Belafonte re-recorded the song with the London Symphony Orchestra and the American Boy Choir for Hallmark's The Tradition of Christmas in 1991.
Similarly, the song was arranged for chorus and recorded by the conductor Leonard De Paur for Columbia Records on the album Calypso Christmas in 1956 (Columbia, CL 923 Mono LP, 1956).[12]
Covers
One of the best-known cover versions of the song is from the German-based disco-group Boney M. from 1978, "Mary's Boy Child – Oh My Lord."[13] This version returned the song to the top of the UK chart.[6] It is one of the best-selling singles of all time in the UK, and has sold 1.87 million copies as of November 2015.[11]
When Hairston found out how well the Boney M version had done, he said: "God bless my soul. That's tremendous for an old fogey like me".[7] He was 78 at the time.
In 2012, the Portuguese priest António Cartageno made a choral arrangement for the song.
Translations
Translated versions include "Hankien Joulu" recorded by Georg Malmstén, "Kauan Sitten Beetlehem" recorded by Petri Laaksonen (fi), "Marian Poika" by Tarja Turunen, "Varje människa har ett ljus" recorded by Jan Malmsjö,[18]"...und Frieden für die Welt" by Rolf Zuckowski, "Maria's Kind" by La Esterella, "Bethlehem" by Rob de Nijs, "Det hände sig för länge sen" recorded by Kikki Danielsson on her 1987 Christmas album Min barndoms jular,[19]"Det hände sig för länge sen" recorded by Stefan Borsch on his 1981 Christmas album I kväll jag tänder ett ljus,[20]"Himlens hemlighet" recorded by Tommy Körberg and "Du är som en sommardag" by dance band Schytts. The Schytts version was in the Swedish chart Svensktoppen for 10 weeks in 1979, where it peaked at No. 1.[21] "Ang Batang Hesus" by mayor_junneil (Filipino). The Sinhala translation is "Kalakata Pera e Bethleheme" Sinhala: "කලකට පෙර ඒ බෙත්ලෙහෙමේ".
The tune is used as the basis for a widespread chant used in British football usually referencing a particular team's closest rivals and the historical boxing day derby games that took place until the 1980s.[23]
^Stanley, Bob (2022). "Whipped Cream and Other Delights: Adventures in Beatleland". Let's Do It - The Birth of Pop Music: A History. New York. p. 564.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
^ ab"Belafonte Tracks - A Discography of Original Recordings - Albums 1949 - 1959". Belafontetracks.ca. Archived from the original on 3 March 2016. Retrieved 9 December 2019. Mary's Boy Child (4:20). RCA-LPM-1402 'An Evening With Belafonte', Matrix Nos: G2PP-9882 / 9883, [recorded in:] 1956 [as a] 33 rpm LP. (Note about 'LPM' (33 rpm Long-Play Monaural Record): RCA assigned this prefix to their early LPs which were all monaural (or single channel) recordings... up until 1962)
^ abcRice, Jo (1982). The Guinness Book of 500 Number One Hits (1st ed.). Enfield, Middlesex: Guinness Superlatives Ltd. p. 33. ISBN0-85112-250-7.
^ abcdeBoney M, John Shearlaw and David Brown, Hamlin Paperbacks, 1979 ISBN0 600 20009 4, page 105
^ ab"Official Singles Chart, "Mary's Boy Child"". Officialcharts.com. Archived from the original on 9 December 2019. Retrieved 9 December 2019. Title: Mary's Boy Child. Artist: Harry Belafonte. Label: RCA. RCA Record Catalogue Number: 1022. First charted: 07.11.1957. Chart run [at number one]: Weeks ending 1957/11/28 through 1958/01/09
^ ab"Mary's Boy Child". Songfacts.com. Songfacts®, LLC. Archived from the original on 10 December 2019. Retrieved 10 December 2019. ...[it was] the first ever British #1 record to have a playing time of more than four minutes (4:12). This stayed at #1 in the UK for seven weeks before becoming the only song to drop from #1 straight out of Top 10 the following week (after Christmas, when it tumbled from #1 to #12). The song returned to the charts the next two years at Christmas, going to #10 in 1958 and #30 in 1959.
^ abMyers, Justin (29 November 2015). "Official Top 20 biggest selling Christmas songs revealed". Official Charts Company. Retrieved 29 November 2015. Mary's Boy Child has hit Christmas Number 1 twice by separate artists: Boney M's disco-lite version from 1978... with 1.89 million sales. Harry Belafonte's version is at 14, from 1957, on 1.19 million.