So it's high time I sorted through my music collection to create a selection of tunes to listen to this holiday season. I have thousands of choices but only so many hours in November and December so I've got a fresh hard drive for my music server and it's time to decide what to put into Heavy, Medium and Light rotation and what gets archived, or even worse - deleted!
The opinions and judgements here are all mine and I don't expect anyone to take them with even a full grain of salt, but these brief reviews might help you remember or discover some great Christmas music you can add to your own holiday library this year.
I'll try to find examples from each album on YouTube though most of the high profile ones shuld be available to stream from the usual suspects.
Do You Hear...Christmas With Heather, Cookie & Raylene Rankin
(AllMusic)
Inoffensive, if a bit paint my numbers, Celtic folk lite from three distaff members of The Rankin Family. The sort of thing that would have played in the background in tourist area Christmas shops a couple of decades ago. Unlikely I’ll return to it. Archived.
Suzanne Carrico - What Christmas Means to Me
(Amazon)
I think I picked this up from a crowdfunding campaign. Pleasant enough cabernet / lounge jazz holiday album. Highlights are the cover of Silver Bells and the samba-ized I’ve Got My Love to Keep Me Warm. Archived.
6th Dimension - Christmastime
The Bells! The Bells!
If you dig that crazy handbell scene, and really, who doesn’t, this is a pretty solid collection of Christmas tunes. If you like handbells. I happen to like handbells, in moderation, so this one is a keeper. Light Rotation
11 Acorn Lane - Celebrate with 11 Acorn Lane.
A free download, I think. Hipster lounge. Not great, though the arrangements are pretty good. Archived.
12 Girls Band - Twelve Girls of Christmas
Holiday tunes played on traditional Chinese instruments by a dozen lovely ladies. A novelty to be sure and not a terrible one. If China has a Branson, these girls have a perpetual residence. Archived,
1910 FruitGum Co. - Bubblegum Christmas
I have a soft spot for bubblegum superstars 1910FGC , Simon Says was one of the first 45s I ever bought, in fact I won it, many, many years ago, on the boardwalk of Palisades Park, along with discs from the Pipkins and Ohio Express.
But this collection is not doing my nostalgia any favors Archived.
Christmas With The Academy - Academy of St. Martin in the Fields Chorus and Academy of St. Martin in the Fields and Sir Neville Marriner.
Something that does deserve to be revisited each season. A lovely album of hymns, carols, and classical favorites. Heavy rotation.
Agnetha Fältskog & Linda Ulvaeus - Nu tändas tusen juleljus (Now a thousand Christmas candles are lit) (1981)
Swedish children’s Christmas album from Abba’s Agnetha and her young (in 1980) daughter Linda. Fans looking for an Abba adjacent holiday album will be sorely disappointed though, this is a kids album heavily featuring a kid. In fact, Agnetha hardly shows up and when she does it’s nothing special. That said this is one of Sweden’s best-selling Christmas albums. Not bad but not a niche I need filling these days. Archived.
Ake Jelving - Christmas in Sweden
From a few decades earlier another Swedish Christmas record but this one’s a lot more fun to listen to. I credit the accordion. Light rotation.
Aimee Mann - One More Drifter in the Snow.
A terrific album that benefits from sounding like an Aimee Mann record. So many artists’ holiday offerings feel dashed off or go off the rails by subverting expectations and sounding nothing like fans expect or hope. This is a holiday essential. Heavy rotation.
Air Supply - The Christmas album
I’ve come to appreciate Air Supply so much more over the years. Not a masterpiece but it sounds like what a traditional holiday variety special might have sounded like had they survived into the 80s. Light (rock) rotation.
Bruce Woodman presents Christmas Carols with a Latin Lilt.
Picked up at Ernie (Not Bert) waaaay back in the day. Such a disappointment, a rather dull album nearly without the least lilt of Latin. I’ve separated the introductory tracks by Luis Palau into a YouTube video and you can read a little but more about the album at A Christmas Yuleblog. Archived.
The World's Greatest Jazzband of Yank Lawson & Bob Haggart - "Hark the Herald Angels Swing." (1972)
I have this buried in my collection somewhere but it showed up on Youtube and I remembered how much I enjoyed this early seventies Big Band Swing album. Medium Rotation.
