Annual Christmas Music Recommendations - 2011: "Downe in Yon Forrest" and "Lighten the Dark"

The Feast of St. Nicholas seems as good a time as any to make my annual Christmas music recommendations for 2011. You can view recommendations from previous years at these links:

New Music Recommendations for the Season (2010)

Music Review: Sting's If On a Winter's Night (2009)

Tip of the Day: Buy Tydings Trew ... Cheap! (2008)

MUST BUY: A Christmas Recording to Celebrate All 12 Days of Christmas (2007)

Favorite Christmas Music (2007)

Tydings Trew (2007)

Favorite Christmas Recordings (2006)

First up for this year is a 2009 release that I recently purchased titled Downe In Yon Forrest (Christmas From The Middle Ages) by Kemper Crabb.


This musical offering contains live CD and DVD recordings of Crabb's 2008 PBS Christmas special. Here's the track list:

1. What Child Is This
2. Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silent
3. The Song Of The Ship
4. Divinum Mysterium (Of The Father's Love Begotten)
5. Downe In Yon Forrest
6. The Coventry Carol
7. The Sussex Carol
8. Personent Hodie
9. Taladh Chrisosda (The Christ Child Lullabye)
10. I Saw Three Ships
11. Veni, Veni Emmanuel (O Come, O Come Emmanuel)
12. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen

The best description I can provide of this recording comes from my wife, Sarah, who, upon hearing this for the first time, responded: "This sounds like 'Dead Can Dance Christmas'." But don't take her word for it, here's a sampling from Youtube:





Good stuff. Very Highly Recommended (must buy).


The next recording I wish to recommend is a 2009 release by the apparently now-defunct English folk group Kerfuffle, titled Lighten The Dark - A Midwinter Album.


The track list is as follows:

1. Three Ships
2. Cherry Tree Carol
3. The Truth From Above
4. Bransles
5. Lullay My Liking
6. Gallery Carol
7. Sussex Carol
8. Nowell, Nowell
9. The Holly & The Ivy
10. Gower Wassail
11. The Bitter Withy

I purchased this CD recently primarily because of the group's outstanding version of Sarah's favorite Christmas carol, "The Sussex Carol" (also known as "On Christmas Night"), but the rest of the recording is outstanding as well. Once again, here is a Youtube sampling of Kerfuffle's very English folk take on Christmas music:













Highly Recommended (you really should buy).

Feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary

"Virgin of the Immaculate Conception" by El Greco

Antiphon: I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, and my soul shall be joyful in my God; for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation and with the robe of justice he hath covered me, as a bride adorned with her jewels.

~ Isaiah 61:10 (Douay-Rheims)

New Music Recommendations for the Season

Every year at this time, I make recommendations for seasonal music appropriate either to Advent, Christmas, or both. You can find past recommendations in the links below. I encourage you to check them out. (You'll notice that there are three ... count 'em ... THREE ... separate posts dedicated to, and a grand total of five ... count 'em ... FIVE ... posts in which I very highly recommend, a CD titled "Tydings Trew". This makes the sixth post in which I do so. If you haven't bought this recording yet, what ARE you waiting for?)

This year, I would like to suggest a couple of new music offerings that I recently purchased.

The first is one that my wife, Sarah, is just wild about. She says it is her new favorite recording of holiday music. It is "Welcome Yule: An English Christmas Revels".


Here is a description of the recording from the Revels website:

This joyous new holiday CD highlights the best of Revels' most popular English-themed Christmas productions and features stunning music, songs and holiday carols from Medieval, Renaissance and Victorian periods. The Christmas Revels Chorus and Children's Chorus are joined by a host of wind, string and brass instruments in a wide array of festive music for the season. Particularly moving is the thrilling live sound of 1,000 audience members filling Sanders Theatre in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with their voices on the peace round, "Dona Nobis Pacem," one of several live cuts found on this new recording. Other live cuts include "The Sussex Mummers' Carol" and The Christmas Revels' iconic signature piece, "The Lord of the Dance."

Featuring music from this year’s show at Sanders Theatre.

[...]

Songlist
1. On Christmas Night
2. Te Deum
3. All Hail to the Days
4. The Cries of London
5. Tomorrow the Fox Will Come to Town
6. Renaissance Dances
7. Salutation Carol/Bring Us In Good Ale
8. In the Bleak Midwinter
9. The Lord of the Dance
10. Ther Is No Rose of Swych Vertu
11. Holly and his Merry Men
12. It Came Upon the Midnight Clear
13. English Country Dances
14. While Shepherds Watched their Flocks by Night
15. Dona Nobis Pacem
16. There Shall a Star from Jacob Come Forth
17. Come and I Will Sing You
18. Rejoice, Ye Tenants of the Earth
19. The Sussex Mummers' Carol

In the past, I have highly recommended other offerings from "The Christmas Revels" collection, and I give their latest recording an even stronger recommendation than I gave to their past efforts.

Very Highly Recommended (must buy).

The other new music offering I wish to recommend is "The Cherry Tree: Songs, Carols & Ballads for Christmas" by Anonymous 4.


Here is the product description from Amazon.com:

Back in the studio after a four year hiatus, Anonymous 4 returns with The Cherry Tree, an instant holiday music classic featuring medieval English carols and Anglo-American spiritual songs. It is the eighteenth original recording for the renowned vocal ensemble and their first since 2006's Gloryland, which debuted at number three on the Billboard classical chart. Anonymous 4 has been a perennial presence on Billboard s Top Classical Albums chart and hit number one with their folk-inspired American Angels in 2004. The Cherry Tree is named after the miracle ballad of Joseph and Mary, the earliest text of which survives from a Coventry Play from around 1400. The 'Cherry Tree' story persisted in many forms, making its way into medieval British carols of the mid-15th century and into British and American traditional ballads. In it, Joseph doubts the divine origin of Mary's pregnancy only to hear Jesus speak from within Mary's womb, causing a cherry tree to bend its branches and offer his mother its fruit. The 2011-12 season marks Anonymous 4's 25th anniversary and the group will be on tour in the US this fall.

You can read more about this recording at the Anonymous 4 website:

Track List
1 Prophetarum presignata
2 Nowel syng we bothe al and som
3 Alma redemptoris mater
4 The Shepherd's Star
5 Newell - Tydings trew
6 Mervele noght Iosep
7 Synge we to this mery cumpane
8 Qui creavit celum
9 A Virdin Unspotted
10 Now may we syngyn
11 Lullay my child - This ender nithgt
12 Star in the East
13 Veni redemptor gencium
14 The Cherry Tree Carol
15 Salve mater misericodie
16 Hail mary ful of grace
17 Bethlehem

[More]

This is the third Christmas recording by Anonymous 4 that I have recommended, having suggested both "On Yoolis Night: Medieval Carols & Motets" and "Wolcum Yule: Celtic and British Songs and Carols" in the past. "The Cherry Tree" definitely surpasses "Wolcum Yule", but no Anonymous 4 recording, in my view, comes close to the transcendant "On Yoolis Night", which , along with Nat King Cole's "The Christmas Song", is my choice for music on Christmas Eve at the Anderson household (although I usually get outvoted by those who'd rather hear Gene Autry or Burl Ives sing "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer"). If you can only own one Anonymous 4 Christmas recording, buy "On Yoolis Night".

But fans of Anonymous 4 will obviously want to own "The Cherry Tree"; and I also recommend this recording for anyone who is interested (as I am) in listening to medieval and renaissance English and early-American Advent and Christmas carols and ballads.

Highly Recommended (you really should buy).


Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
Music Review: Sting's If On a Winter's Night

Tip of the Day: Buy Tydings Trew ... Cheap!

MUST BUY: A Christmas Recording to Celebrate All 12 Days of Christmas

Favorite Christmas Music

Tydings Trew

Favorite Christmas Recordings

Sleepers Awake

"Sleepers Awake" by Johann Sebastian Bach

Brothers and sisters: You know the time; it is the hour now for you to awake from sleep. For our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed; the night is advanced, the day is at hand.
~ Romans 13:11, 12


Therefore, stay awake! For you do not know on which day your Lord will come. Be sure of this: if the master of the house had known the hour of night when the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and not let his house be broken into. So too, you also must be prepared, for at an hour you do not expect, the Son of Man will come.
~ Matthew 24:42-44

O Sapentia - The Coming Lord is Wisdom

Old Testament Prophetic Verses:
Isaias 11:2-3
And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him: the spirit of wisdom, and of understanding, the spirit of counsel, and of fortitude, the spirit of knowledge, and of godliness. And he shall be filled with the spirit of the fear of the Lord, He shall not judge according to the sight of the eyes, nor reprove according to the hearing of the ears.

Isaias 28:29
This also is come forth from the Lord God of hosts, to make his counsel wonderful, and magnify justice.

Antiphon:
O Wisdom that comest out of the mouth of the Most High, that reachest from one end to another, and orderest all things mightily and sweetly, come to teach us the way of prudence!

O Sapientia, quæ ex ore Altissimi prodiisti, attingens a fine usque ad finem, fortiter suaviterque disponens omnia: veni ad docendum nos viam prudentiæ.

Hymn:
O come, Thou Wisdom, from on high,
and order all things far and nigh;
to us the path of knowledge show,
and teach us in her ways to go.

Rejoice! Rejoice!
Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel!

Veni, O Sapientia,
quae hic disponis omnia,
veni, viam prudentiae
ut doceas et gloriae.

Gaude, gaude, Emmanuel
Nascetur pro te, Israel.


Come, Lord Jesus!

(Source: fisheaters.com)

Music Review: Sting's If On a Winter's Night

Buy this.

Unless, that is, you're looking for a Christmas recording with clappy happy Jingle Bells, Deck the Halls, and other songs of merry-making. This CD is just the opposite. Spare. Introspective. Contemplative. Quiet. Almost melancholy. Probably more fitting for Advent in both mood and song selection.

Highlights include:

A jazzy yet medieval feeling version of "Gabriel's Message" (originally recorded by Sting in a more synthesized version for the 1987 album A Very Special Christmas);

"Soul Cake"; and

my favorite "Ther is No Rose of Such Virtue" - the alleluias on that one are magnificent.

I haven't stopped listening since it came in the mail the other day.

Song List:
1. Gabriel's Message 2:33
2. Soul Cake 3:27
3. There Is No Rose Of Such Virtue 4:03
4. The Snow It Melts The Soonest 3:43
5. Christmas At Sea 4:37
6. Lo How A Rose E'er Blooming 2:41
7. Cold Song 3:16
8. The Burning Babe 2:42
9. Now Winter Comes Slowly 3:05
10. The Hounds Of Winter 5:49
11. Balulalow 3:10
12. Cherry Tree Carol 3:11
13. Lullaby For An Anxious Child 2:50
14. Hurdy Gurdy Man 2:49
15. You Only Cross My Mind In Winter 2:35

Our Sunday Visitor: "Mary -- Crucial to Christmas"

Lutheran pastor Charles Dickson, author of the book A Protestant Pastor Looks at Mary, writes in Our Sunday Visitor:

As we approach the Advent and Christmas seasons, we begin to ask ourselves the question as to what role the mother of our Lord should play in our worship and festival observances. How important a place? The answer in a nutshell is: a very important place.

Protestant observances of the events surrounding the Incarnation all but deny the importance of Mary. A few references to her in sermons, a character in the Christmas play, and a statue in the Nativity scene are about as far as it goes in terms of recognizing the role of Our Lady in the divine transcendent event. However, Catholic observers are quick to point out that their own Church hasn't always properly emphasized her importance.

The life and ministry of Jesus on earth begins with the Annunciation and the Incarnation. The vehicle or means by which the Incarnation took place is the Blessed Virgin Mary. The Incarnation of the Son of God requires that we discover God's purposes in the Word made flesh. Through the Annunciation, Mary learned that her motherhood would extend to all who stand in need of God's mercy and forgiveness. As Father Romanus Cessario writes: ''If we reflect on the truth that God chose to come among us as a little Child, we will begin to comprehend what Mary's spiritual motherhood means for the Church.''

Not to emphasize the central role of Mary in history is to dilute the importance of the Incarnation. And when the Incarnation is no longer crucial, the basic tenets of the Christian faith begin to crumble.

In one of his talks on Our Lady, Pope John Paul II clarifies the basis for emphasizing the role of Mary in the Christmas message: ''The fiat of the Annunciation inaugurates the New Covenant between God and the creature. While it incorporates Jesus into our race according to nature, it incorporates Mary with Him according to grace. The bond between God and humankind that was broken by sin is now happily restored.'' As Christians we realize that this change occurs only because of what God has accomplished in Jesus through Mary.

[More]

Archbishop Chaput: "On Christian Hope"

(Hat tip: Custos Fidei)

Denver Archbishop Charles J. Chaput writes at First Things:

Pope Benedict XVI released his new encyclical letter, Spe Salvi (Saved by Hope), November 30, just two days before the beginning of Advent. Not surprisingly, the Holy Father’s timing was perfect because Advent, more than any other season of the year, is rooted in the virtue of hope.

For Catholics, the real new year begins not on January 1 but on the First Sunday of Advent, the day when the Church begins her annual new cycle of Scripture readings and worship. The season of Advent, deriving from the Latin verb advenire, meaning “to come” or “to arrive,” has a two-fold purpose: first, to remind us of the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem and all that it implied for the salvation of the world; and, second, to ready us for Christ’s second coming at the end of time as king and judge of creation. Like Lent, Advent is a time of preparation. Also like Lent, Advent is a penitential season–but not in the same strict way. Rather, Advent embodies the words of the liturgy, which remind us that “we wait in joyful hope” for the coming of our savior, Jesus Christ.

Benedict’s new encyclical is a rich and challenging document. It’s not easily absorbed in one reading. But one of its most important lines can be found right in the opening sentences. The Holy Father reminds us that, for Christians, the virtue of hope enables us to face the burdens of daily life, no matter how heavy. He writes that “the present, even if it is arduous, can be lived and accepted if it leads towards a goal, if we can be sure of this goal, and if this goal is great enough to justify the effort of the journey.” Faith in Jesus Christ leads us to hope for eternal life. Christ’s life gives our lives meaning. If we really believe in Jesus Christ, we will have confidence in the future, no matter how bleak some days or some problems seem. For, in the end, Jesus has already won our salvation and the happiness that comes with it.

[More]