Three to Consider: Hidden Holiday Treats

I am still happily preoccupied with seasonal activities (and less happily still dealing with work too close to the big day). So here is a lazy offering to fill the time let's take a look at a new category--holiday tunes that appear on regular albums as opposed to included on entire holiday albums. They just sort of pop-up on these albums.

In many cases, I am not a big fan of these as they seem terribly out of place to me. For instance, one of my all time favorite jazz artists is Dexter Gordon and one of my favorite tunes of his is "The Panther" which is on the album with the same title (it is also the reason our big black and white cat's name is Dexter). Anyway, in the midst of this album comes Dex's version of "The Christmas Song." It is a great version and, in fact, leads off a nice jazz holiday compilation album I have . . .  but it is totally out of place there.

Now this is surely part of my over-the-top rules about holiday music which shall never be played before Thanksgiving our after New Year's Day (really, that is enough isn't it?). Of course, as with all hard-and-fast rules, there are exceptions and here are three of mine. The key to all of these very different tunes is that they all work as holiday songs and as songs on the albums they appear on.

First up, we have The Waitresses with "Christmas Wrapping"--and this is a bit of stretch since it was first released as an EP, but I have it where I suspect many do which is on their Best Of album. So we find it mixed in with other holiday favorites such as "I Know What Boys Like" and "They're All Out of Liquor, Let's Find Another Party." And yet, it works--perhaps cuz it is so eighties danceable, who knows.

Next we have an absolutely beautiful retelling of the Christmas story from Bruce Cockburn. No sap here, just a great storyteller putting his spin on a narrative that has been told a million times. I love, in particular, how he characterizes Joseph as the miffed-jealous partner and how Mary sets him straight. "Cry of a Tiny Babe" sits in the midst of a great Cockburn album Nothing But a Burning Light which is held together by a theme of searching for the character of a man's soul (and for Bruce, I do think it is about a man's character), which is perhaps why this fits so well.

And last, we have Chrissie Hynde singing "2000 Miles" from the Pretenders Learning to Crawl album. This tune is really a song of love and longing, but the use of Christmastime as a place-holder for happier times and the snow imagery make it a fine holiday tune, although it also serves as a wonderful closing tune to this album.

Christmas Wrapping
Cry of a Tiny Babe
2000 Miles

Holiday Music: Bruce Cockburn

As we emerge from the Thanksginving weekend and enter into the high holiday season, I must admit that I am a total uncrtical fan of holiday music (primarily Christmas tunes given my upbringing). I have a kind of embarassing amount of holiday music and I am really pretty resistant to hearing too much of it during December. Don't ask me to listen to a single track before Thanksgving, but after that, it is my primary set of music.

As a result, it will be unavoidable for me to not write about it since it will represent the majority of what I will listen to for the next month. However, in the interest of hopefully keeping the small random group of TR readers coming back, I have developed a kind of "advent strategy" to posting about holiday music. I am going to limit myself to one disc a week leading up to Christmas. My goal is to give you one pop/rock influenced album, one jazz, one classical, and one "classic" holiday disc--the last category providing me the opportunity to post on anything I want as long as I deem it a classic. See how that works?

Okay, so let's get started. My first offering is Bruce Cockburn's 1993 release simply named Christmas. If you like Cockburn's music and you like holiday tunes, this is a must have. It is all acoustic, just in case you were worried that Bruce might bust into one of his rocking rages where he tears into the commercialism of the holiday--his point is more subtle here. This album is focused on the history of this music and on conveying a real sense of belief in the best of this season.

He travels through music to give us 16th century Spanish music, to "The Huron Carol" from the 1600's in Jesuit influenced Canada, to a host of traditional carols. But this is no world-music disc as the music really feels like a group of musicians sitting around with guitar, fiddle, dulcimer, harp, accordion and more re-telling these stories and celebrating something quite spiritual through their interpretations of these songs.

The arrangements are the key with gospel and blues being the driving genre. Cockburn's folk sound (here with a heavy dose of French-Canadian feel) mixed in with his usual story-telling orientation creates a certain sound that is simple and joyful.

Here are a few samples. The first is "Early on One Christmas Morn" which Cockburn reports first hearing on an anthology of early gospel recordings--this one by The Cottontop Mountain Sanctified Singers (dig that name!). The second is one of my favs "I Saw Three Ships". Lastly, there is "Les Anges Dans Nos Campagnes" which you will quickly recognize as "Angels We Have Heard on High" which is a traditional French carol from the 18th century, but as Bruce notes has a "rhythmic groove . . . written right into it."

I think these will give you a sense of what makes this album so special.

Early on One Christmas Morn Buy Album
I Saw Three Ships
Les Anges Dans Nos Campagnes