An American Christmas

"An American Christmas" - The Boston Camerata  (they are an "early music ensemble")

Probably one of my top five favorite Christmas album out there.  I won the CD as a prize from the local classical music station (which sadly got bought out and switched to some other format several years ago, but was a staple of my childhood).... The DJ (who has an amazing voice himself) would do kids requests for Christmas music during a few hours in the mornings during the time leading up to Christmas. And kids would request their carols, and you could dedicate songs to friends/family, etc and they'd be read out... It was really cute and fun, and you'd listen for your songs etc.  Anyways, I loved it and earned the nickname 'dedication queen' LOL because that's how big of a nerd I am. But I also got some free tickets to some performances and a stack of great classical CDs (which I still have) - including this one. It is a whole different animal than what is generally associated with Christmas music today.

Which is great because my parents aren't really holiday music people, but this has good crossover appeal because the vocals are just strikingly fantastic, that you can still love it, even if you're not into Christmas. And especially if you like nice old traditional songs that you can imagine being sung in some stern Puritan meetinghouse or the like. And I do.

The whole thing is really old, folksy, songs we don't really hear ever, nor would necessarily even think of some of these being "Christmas-y". It's very different. I could rave about how lovely the singing is... it's just all stellar. A nice refreshing cleanse for the ears (and maybe the soul) from all the poppy-plastic-overplayed 'holiday' fluff tunes that dominate the airwaves this time of year. Personally if I hear any more 'Christmas' songs that contain the word 'shorty', I am going to burn something down (not because it's not christmasy, just because it's terrible). If you occasionally feel that way, and like classical/renaissance/folk things - than you too may love this album as much as I do. There's something so hauntingly beautiful about the melodies and arrangements.

I listened to it on the plane down yesterday and it drowned out both kids and idiots with admirable ease/grace. Highly recommend. Unfortunately, though, it seems people aren't putting the songs up on YT... didn't find any fanvids set to them, LOL.


You can hear two more on their site, and you can read some educational liner notes as well. They also have an all Renaissance Christmas album as well, and you can hear one song here. Or hit their shop for many other good albums.



(I hope the  sound on these works for you. It worked fine when I drafted this post at my house, but my parents house it's reallllllly faint. I'm hoping that's just because of their terrible computer, not the sound quality of the video. I also couldn't get the share feature to work on the second, again, hoping it all works for you.)

"Bozrah"





"Kingsbridge"- http://www.youtu.be/watch?v=6eIj4IB6HO8&feature=related



What are your favorite not-so-famous Christmas songs? Please share in the comments.


Merry Christmas!!!!