Thanks for your interest in the Overman Carols!
Hi, I’m Bob Overman, the composer half of the team that brings you the new Overman Carol each year, and this is the story of how this all started!
My father, Dr. Richard Overman, is a theologian, and in the family Christmas letter he always used to close with a two-line poetic verse to get family & friends thinking.
My father, Dr. Richard Overman, is a theologian, and in the family Christmas letter he always used to close with a two-line poetic verse to get family & friends thinking.
In 1987 he was inspired to write a full carol lyric in place of the short verse. I had recently finished a music degree, and upon reading the lyric I was inspired to set it to music. When Dad & I listened to the end result, we realized that this was a Good Thing, and we both agreed on the spot to create a new carol together every Christmas until one of us was no longer able. So far, so good--thirty-one carols have resulted from that original inspiration!
I grew up listening to the *Alfred Burt Carols, which were also a Father-Son collaboration in the 1950’s. Those songs were very popular in their day, and still get air play. Alfred Burt unfortunately passed away from cancer, but not before several of his friends in Hollywood got together and made a recording so his wife & kids could enjoy the income from the royalties. I think the idea to keep writing carols together was partly inspired by their work.
In our family every year in late October Dad sits in his reading chair and composes his poem. He sends me the lyrics, and I usually read them several times and then let them percolate for a while. This experience is unlike most song-writing that I do, because the tune usually sort of appears in my awareness already nearly complete, and I have to stop whatever I am doing and write it down. This year’s carol surprised me while I was driving, and I had to pull over and jot it down on the back of a hardware store receipt, the only paper I had handy!
Every year Dad & I created the carol and shared the piano/vocal music with our friends & family. In year 10 my wife and I did a Christmas Music project at our church, named ‘Joy, Joy, Christmas Joy’ after the tenth carol, for which we got a choir together and performed the first 10 carols for our church family. I put together a songbook, for which my sister provided several ink drawing illustrations. We sold a few dozen songbooks, which was gratifying, but lots of our friends encouraged us to make recordings so they could enjoy the carols even if they didn’t know how to play the piano and sing.
By this time my wife & I had moved to beautiful Victoria BC in Canada, where we served as Music Directors at a large downtown church. Our first daughter was still in the baby basket when we went to work in a bedroom in our little harbourside townhouse, and my wife and I recorded the first 14 carols in the evenings while the baby slept in the next room.
Thanks for your interest in the Overman Carols!
Hi, I’m Bob Overman, the composer half of the team that brings you the new Overman Carol each year, and this is the story of how this all started!
My father, Dr. Richard Overman, is a theologian, and in the family Christmas letter he always used to close with a two-line poetic verse to get family & friends thinking.
In 1987 he was inspired to write a full carol lyric in place of the short verse. I had recently finished a music degree, and upon reading the lyric I was inspired to set it to music. When Dad & I listened to the end result, we realized that this was a Good Thing, and we both agreed on the spot to create a new carol together every Christmas until one of us was no longer able. So far, so good: thirty-two carols have resulted from that original inspiration!
I grew up listening to the Alfred Burt Carols, which were also a Father-Son collaboration in the 1950’s. Those songs were very popular in their day, and still get air play. Alfred Burt unfortunately passed away from cancer, but not before several of his friends in Hollywood got together and made a recording so his wife & kids could enjoy the income from the royalties. I think the idea to keep writing carols together was partly inspired by their work.
In our family every year in late October Dad sits in his reading chair and composes his poem. He sends me the lyrics, and I usually read them several times and then let them percolate for a while.
I always prepare a piano and voice version so the new carol can be played and sung in our churches, and now that our kids are old enough, recently I have been writing a 5-voice a cappella arrangement for our family to sing.
Every year Dad & I created the carol and shared the piano/vocal music with our friends & family. In year 10 my wife and I did a Christmas Music project at our church, named ‘Joy, Joy, Christmas Joy’ after the tenth carol, for which we got a choir together and performed the first 10 carols for our church family. I put together a songbook, for which my sister provided several ink drawing illustrations. We sold a few dozen songbooks, which was gratifying, but lots of our friends encouraged us to make recordings so they could enjoy the carols even if they didn’t know how to play the piano and sing.
By this time my wife & I had moved to beautiful Victoria BC in Canada, where we served as Music Directors at a large downtown church. Our first daughter was still in the baby basket when we went to work in a bedroom in our little harbourside townhouse, and my wife and I recorded the first 14 carols in the evenings while the baby slept in the next room.
We produced our first CD and made that available to our friends & family, many of whom bought copies as gifts for their friends. Each year the newest carol was performed in our church either by our Choir or as a solo, and also got premiered in Dad & Mom’s church in Tacoma Washington. Several more years went by, and there were ten more carols in the collection waiting to be recorded.
The series nearly got interrupted in the summer of 2011, when my son and I had a close brush with drowning while swimming in the ocean near Tofino here on Vancouver Island. We got caught in an outflow tide, got separated from one another and pushed pretty far out to sea, and before my 10-year-old son came along with his waveboard and essentially rescued me, I was close to going under.
I kid you not, one of the thoughts that crossed my mind as I struggled in the waves was--”I can’t die now, I haven’t recorded the other carols yet!” With luck and answered prayers, we made it safely to shore, and I spent that night in our tent listening to the first CD, glad to be alive. Even years later I recall that adventure and am grateful each morning to have another day to live and love and make music to the glory of God.
Later that fall I orchestrated the next 10 carols. My wife & I recorded them, this time with help from our 3 kids, as Grandpa had written one lyric with children asking questions and Father answering. The album cover features a Byzantine-inspired fabric wall hanging created by my sister Leah Wegener.
We have written nine more carols since the release of Volume 2. These have not yet been published, but we have performed them and are in the process of getting them recorded for publication. The last several have been arranged for 5-part a cappella, because our youngest daughter reached the age where she could carry her own part. So we’ve been singing these carols and other awesome Christmas music (thank you Pentatonix!) and having a blast as a family at Christmas time.
We do feel compelled to get this music out into the world, so the good news of Jesus’ coming to earth can be told in one more fresh way. So thanks to you who have already helped with that by sharing on Facebook!
A few years ago we put the CD’s out on Amazon and Spotify, but with no control or input over the marketing they have been quietly collecting dust on the virtual shelves.
So with the recordings we have earned enough to cover the costs, but the royalties are definitely not sending our kids to music school! This website & Facebook page are in effort to get the word out, and quite honestly, make a little bit of extra income to help out with their education.
This experience is unlike most song-writing that I do, because the tune usually sort of appears in my awareness already nearly complete, and I have to stop whatever I am doing and write it down. The 2017 carol surprised me while I was driving, and I had to pull over and jot it down on the back of a hardware store receipt, the only paper I had handy!
Soon we'll have the MP3 albums of Volumes 1 & 2, plus a PDF piano/vocal songbook available here if you would like to make our family Christmas tradition a part of your family's Christmas. Meanwhile you can download piano/vocal versions of each carol.
Thanks for your interest, and for your help getting the word out!
-Merry Christmas all year!
Bob Overman
PS: If you're interested in my other choral compositions, such as SATB settings of the Psalms, please visit overmanmusic.com.
I always prepare a piano and voice version so the new carol can be played and sung in our churches, and now that our kids are old enough, recently I have been writing a 5-voice a cappella arrangement for our family to sing.
