It’s a cherished Christmas classic that’s been recorded by Ralph Stanley, Ricky Skaggs, Patty Loveless, the Judds, Emmylou Harris, and Neil Young; and it was first released in Lawrenceburg, Tennessee.

The song ‘Beautiful Star of Bethlehem’ has been a seasonal staple in choir lofts and pews around the globe for more than eighty years. Its words are simple and direct, encapsulating the hope and promise of the Christmas story with a catchy melody.

‘Beautiful Star’ was written by Robert Fisher Boyce in a dairy barn in Rutherford County in 1938. Boyce, a farmer, “wrote the song in the summer months while seated on a milking stool in the hallway of the barn,” according to his youngest son. He escaped to the barn to write his composition because “the noise of the household filled with little children was distracting.”

It took Boyce less than a week to write the song, and he maintained until his death that he was only able to do it by divine inspiration. His children agreed with him. Nannie Lou, his daughter, said that she helped him put the song to music on the family’s old upright piano. In 1940, Boyce sold his ‘Star’ to the father of Southern Gospel music, Lawrenceburg’s own James D. Vaughan.

Vaughan published ‘Beautiful Star of Bethlehem’ in 1940 in a songbook called ‘Beautiful Praise,’ where it appeared as hymn number 24. The final musical arrangement of the song was written by Adger M. Pace. The song gained national attention in 1990 when the Judds chose to sing it on the nationally-televised ‘Bob Hope Christmas Show.’

Do you have a favorite Christmas song?