{"id":152689,"date":"2020-12-20T23:50:23","date_gmt":"2020-12-21T06:50:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/?p=152689"},"modified":"2020-12-20T23:50:23","modified_gmt":"2020-12-21T06:50:23","slug":"my-favorite-holiday-albums","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2020\/12\/20\/my-favorite-holiday-albums.html","title":{"rendered":"My Favorite Holiday Albums"},"content":{"rendered":"

Because why the heck not? I have almost 15 hours of music on my playlist that’s rated over 3\/5 stars. I realize the idea of buying a “CD” or other album format is almost as quaint as Currier & Ives prints, but … well, get off my lawn.<\/p>\n

Anyway, we have a lot of favorites, but here are some that sort to the top of the 4-5 star list.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Annie Lennox,\u00a0A Christmas Cornucopia (2010)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Lennox belts things out with such raw passion, that hearing the former Eurythmics star with songs like “Angels from the Realms of Glory,” “God Rest Ye, Merry Gentlemen,” and the Coventry Carol is almost a painful experience.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Bruce Cockburn, Christmas<\/em> (1993)<\/strong><\/p>\n

These are mostly traditional tunes, sung in a country-pop style by Cockburn. “Mary Had a Baby,” “Down in Yon Forest,” and an original, “Shepherds” are some of my faves.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Loreena McKennitt, To Drive the Cold Winter Away<\/em> (1994)<\/strong><\/p>\n

McKennitt’s dulcet tones do great with older, traditional English carols (with an occasional original). High marks to the Winter Garden<\/em> (1995) as well, though it has only five songs on it.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Jo-el Sonnier, et al., Cajun Christmas<\/em> (2002)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Some fine Cajun \/ Zydeco Christmas carol instrumentals. Great renditions of “The First Noel” and “Deck the Halls”. Fresh and zingy and fun — just as a carol should be.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Vince Guaraldi Trio,\u00a0A Charlie Brown Christmas\u00a0<\/em>(2012)<\/strong><\/p>\n

A full album of jazzy, piano-forward carols from the guy who did the\u00a0Charlie Brown Christmas Special<\/em> of holy name. Very mellow, enjoyable set of background music for any holiday party.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Misc., A Classic Christmas<\/em>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

A great collection of 1950s-60s Christmas tunes from Perry Como, Ella Fitzgerald, Dean Martin, Eartha Kitt, Bing Crosby, et al. We love the mid-century classic carol albums, and this one is a great combo of those.<\/p>\n

This one I can’t find on Amazon any more … but, then, I picked it up in a store on a visual impulse buy. And there are plenty of compilations of favorite crooners and classic singers doing Christmas that you can find what you are looking for. That’s how we ended up with a lot of our holiday selections.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Having Christmas carols in the background is part of our holiday ambience<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":152718,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[68,42],"tags":[2122],"class_list":["post-152689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-holidays","category-media-music","tag-christmas-carol"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/charlie-brown-christmas.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":5467,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/03\/07\/musical_interlu.html","url_meta":{"origin":152689,"position":0},"title":"Musical interlude","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 7-Mar-04 2:07pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Margie and I were listening to the RotK sound track in the car on the way to dinner last night. The final tune, Annie Lennox on \"Into the West,\" came...","rel":"","context":"In "Lord of the Rings \/ Hobbit"","block_context":{"text":"Lord of the Rings \/ Hobbit","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/franchises\/lord-of-the-rings"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":49037,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/12\/18\/movie-review-a-christmas-carol-1999.html","url_meta":{"origin":152689,"position":1},"title":"Movie Review: "A Christmas Carol" (1999)","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 18-Dec-14 3:40pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Here's a shocker: Patrick Stewart makes a great Scrooge. Yeah, I know, who'd've thunk ...?The rest of the cast here is pretty good, too. If you haven't seen this version, it's worth doing so, though I still have a sneaking fondness for my first \"Christmas Carol,\" where Scrooge was played\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10543,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/12\/23\/mambo_bed_time_in_holbroo.html","url_meta":{"origin":152689,"position":2},"title":"Mambo bed time in Holbrook","author":"***Dave","date":"Sat 23-Dec-06 8:02pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Mambo bed time in Holbrook Arizona. Good night Kitten. UPDATE: After the the coincidence of nestling into bed just in time for Annie Lennox and \"Into the West\" on the...","rel":"","context":"In "Lord of the Rings \/ Hobbit"","block_context":{"text":"Lord of the Rings \/ Hobbit","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/franchises\/lord-of-the-rings"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/\/images\/5b381bfa12.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5615,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/02\/10\/familiarity_of.html","url_meta":{"origin":152689,"position":3},"title":"Familiarity of the Rings","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 10-Feb-04 9:21pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I am often asked, \"What kind of music do you like?\" Actually, I'm rarely asked that, but work with me here. My answer is, invariably, \"Familiar music.\" That is to...","rel":"","context":"In "Lord of the Rings \/ Hobbit"","block_context":{"text":"Lord of the Rings \/ Hobbit","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/franchises\/lord-of-the-rings"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":13448,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/12\/09\/ho_ho_hwtf.html","url_meta":{"origin":152689,"position":4},"title":"Ho-ho-hWTF?!","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 9-Dec-08 12:27pm","format":false,"excerpt":"It's a holiday classic: John Scalzi's The 10 Least Successful Holiday Specials of All Time: The Village People in Can\u2019t Stop the Christmas Music \u2014 On Ice! (1980)\u00a0 Undeterred by...","rel":"","context":"In "Holidays"","block_context":{"text":"Holidays","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/holidays"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.scalzi.com\/villagepeople.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5682,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/01\/26\/lord_of_the_glo.html","url_meta":{"origin":152689,"position":5},"title":"Lord of the Globes","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 26-Jan-04 10:21am","format":false,"excerpt":"Lord of the Rings: Return of the King had major wins at the Golden Globes, including Drama Picture, Director, Original Score, and Original Song. 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