Welcome Yule - An English Christmas Revels
- The Christmas RevelsNew collection of performances, many recorded live, from the long running series of seasonal period entertainments offered each year by John Langstaff's Christmas Revels, in this case the Cambridge, Mass incarnation of the group. Olde English carols, dances and hymns, most, but not all, seasonal in nature, transport the listener back in time to a very different Christmas celebration than we're used to in these days of frantic shopping, overloaded schedules and holiday tidings poisoned by cynicism and irony.
Nothing can match actually attending one of these remarkable performances but there is a wonderful energy that more than makes up for the lack of visuals (and the occaionally shambolic production on a few of the live recordings), and while there is an occasional whiff of the amatauer theatrical, the obvious affection the performers feel for the material shines through.
Other Christmas Revels recordings include 2000's A Victorian Christmas Revels, 1995's Sing We Now Of Christmas, 1987's Christmas Day In The Morning: A Revels Celebration Of The Winter Solstice, 1982's Wassail! Wassail! Early American Christmas Music and The Christmas Revels: In Celebration Of The Winter Solstice from 1978.
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