O Christmas Tree lyricsO Christmas Tree lyrics
With Tobia · Germany

O Christmas Tree

Key: G80 BPMGuitar & Piano chords

O Christmas Tree Lyrics. A cheerful ode to the evergreen fir, sung in German as “O Tannenbaum” since the early 1800s and beloved in English-speaking homes ever since. Here you will find the lyrics, meaning, and chords for guitar and piano.

O Christmas Tree video

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Verse 1

GO Christmas tree, CO Christmas Gtree,
How Dlovely are your Gbranches!
Not only Cgreen when summer’s Ghere,
But also Dwhen ’tis cold and Gdrear.
GO Christmas tree, CO Christmas Gtree,
How Dlovely are your Gbranches!
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Chords for Guitar & Piano

G
Guitar
DGB
Piano
C
×
Guitar
CEG
Piano
D
××
Guitar
DA
Piano
Good to know

What “O Christmas Tree” Means

The melody is an old German folk tune; the words known today were written in 1824 by Leipzig teacher and composer Ernst Anschutz, building on an earlier and quite different set of 1819 lyrics about lost love, not trees. Anschutz turned the evergreen fir into a symbol of steady faithfulness, exactly the quality that has made it feel so at home beside a Christmas tree every winter since.
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This lullaby is also available as a full handplayed recording.

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Sources & rights

  • Words and melody: see the credits in the text of this page. Older songs are traditional or in the public domain; songs by known authors keep their authors' credit.
  • Recording and arrangement: real instruments played by hand, no AI music, by Relax In No Time.
  • Chords: written by us for guitar and piano.
  • Translation: our own meaning-for-meaning translation, written for understanding. The sung words stay in the original language.

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