Music for Advent and Christmas

Started by Harry, November 20, 2007, 02:10:28 AM

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premont

#440
Quote from: VonStupp on December 04, 2021, 03:02:22 AM
JS Bach
Christen, atzet diesen Tag, BWV 63

Modern Instrument Bach is always interesting to me when it appears nowadays,

Following Bruce Haynes I prefer to say romantic instruments instead of modern instruments, since these instruments haven't changed significantly during the last 150 years. So much more as he term "modern" indicates something up to date.
γνῶθι σεαυτόν

VonStupp

Quote from: (: premont :) on December 04, 2021, 03:26:13 PM
Following Bruce Haynes I prefer to say romantic instruments instead of modern instruments, since these instruments haven't changed significantly during tha lasr 150 years. So much more as he term "modern" indicates something up to date.

Interesting; I don't think I have seen it termed that way before.

VS
"All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff."

VonStupp

Paul Paray (1886-1979)
Pastorale de Noël

Assumption Grotto Orchestra & Chorus - Fr. Eduard Perrone


VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
I wish there were a better recording of this work, for Paul Paray's oratorio Christmas Pastorale deserves to be heard apart from these amateur forces.

Still these Detroit-based performers give it their best, and tenor David Troiano is the best of the bunch.

As a side note, the paired Joan of Arc oratorio is a different work than what Paray paired with his Saint-Saëns Organ Symphony on Mercury.

VS

 
"All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff."

vandermolen

A big thumbs up for James MacMillan's new 'Christmas Oratorio' which I heard in London tonight.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

bhodges

Quote from: vandermolen on December 04, 2021, 03:47:20 PM
A big thumbs up for James MacMillan's new 'Christmas Oratorio' which I heard in London tonight.

Can't wait to hear this (and I'm not even much of a Christmas guy). Loved your report on the concerts thread.

--Bruce

vers la flamme

I love organ music around Christmastide... This disc is just excellent:


vandermolen

Quote from: Brewski on December 04, 2021, 04:11:51 PM
Can't wait to hear this (and I'm not even much of a Christmas guy). Loved your report on the concerts thread.

--Bruce

Thanks Bruce. I think that the Amsterdam performance is on you tube.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

VonStupp

#447
Franz Liszt: Christmas Tree Suite
Jules Massenet: Last Sleep of the Virgin
Doreen Carwithen: On the Twelfth Day
Otto Nicolai: Christmas Overture on 'Vom Himmel Hoch'
Leopold Mozart: Classic Sleighride
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor: Christmas Overture
Philip Lane: Overture on French Carols
John Carmichael: Sleigh Ride to Thredbo

BBC Concert Orchestra - Barry Wordsworth


VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
More serious orchestral music than the cartoon cover implies, I bought this for Anthony Collins' orchestration of Liszt's Christmas Tree Suite, but ended up enjoying the rest.

Only a tiny bit of choral music here, and the narrated piece is 5 minutes at most. Otherwise, 70 minutes of light orchestral music from mostly historical composers.

VS

"All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff."

Pohjolas Daughter

Quote from: VonStupp on December 05, 2021, 11:03:45 AM
Franz Liszt: Christmas Tree Suite
Jules Massenet: Last Sleep of the Virgin
Doreen Carwithen: On the Twelfth Day
Otto Nicolai: Christmas Overture on 'Vom Himmel Hoch'
Leopold Mozart: Classic Sleighride
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor: Christmas Overture
Philip Lane: Overture on French Carols
John Carmichael: Sleigh Ride to Thredbo

BBC Concert Orchestra - Barry Wordsworth


VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
More serious orchestral music than the cartoon cover implies, I bought this for Anthony Collins' orchestration of Liszt's Christmas Tree Suite, but ended up enjoying the rest.

Only a tiny bit of choral music here, and the narrated piece is 5 minutes at most. Otherwise, 70 minutes of light orchestral music from mostly historical composers.

VS


Boy, I don't recall hearing any of those works before.  I'll have to see whether or not I can find any samples on y.t.  And sweet cover!

I should start hauling out some holiday music here.

PD

PD
Pohjolas Daughter

VonStupp

Quote from: Pohjolas Daughter on December 06, 2021, 05:04:18 AM
Boy, I don't recall hearing any of those works before.  I'll have to see whether or not I can find any samples on y.t.  And sweet cover!

I should start hauling out some holiday music here.

PD

While I wanted it for Liszt's Christmas Tree Suite, I also wanted something for the girls too. They liked it, but I was surprised as to the quality, even if the literature is a bit slight.

VS
"All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff."

VonStupp

#450
Benjamin Britten
Saint Nicolas, op. 42

Anothony Rolfe Johnson, tenor
English Chamber Orchestra & Corydon Singers
Matthew Best


VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
A wide-ranging, 50-minute cantata with a lot going on throughout. This is the finest coronation sequence I have heard in this work, and the sequence of St. Nick rescuing the Pickled Boys is a hoot!

I love Rolfe Johnson in this work, although Stephen Layton's version, also on Hyperion, is perhaps superior as a whole.

Maybe a stretch for Christmas Music, though... VS

"All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff."

Maestro267

If Penderecki 2 can be included, then so can Schnittke's Concerto grosso No. 2 which also quotes Silent Night.

VonStupp

Dave Brubeck
La Fiesta De La Posada

St. Paul Chamber Orchestra & Dale Warland Singers
Dennis Russell Davies


VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
I am not sure why Brubeck's Christmas cantata hasn't received more recordings, at least in the US where it was performed quite a bit for a while.

VS

"All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff."

stingo

Quote from: VonStupp on December 08, 2021, 04:07:40 AM
Dave Brubeck
La Fiesta De La Posada

St. Paul Chamber Orchestra & Dale Warland Singers
Dennis Russell Davies


VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
I am not sure why Brubeck's Christmas cantata hasn't received more recordings, at least in the US where it was performed quite a bit for a while.

VS



Ooh I like the Dale Warland Singers!

Jo498

This seems less than half of the many Xmas albums the Boston camerata did, but I got them cheaply as a collection:

[asin]B000005IVR[/asin][asin]B01K8MLKT4[/asin][asin]B000005IXX[/asin]

It's a bit unfortunate that half of the "Baroque Christmas" is Charpentier's Messe de Minuit pour Noel which is a nice piece but well covered elsewhere (I have at least two recordings already).
Tout le malheur des hommes vient d'une seule chose, qui est de ne savoir pas demeurer en repos, dans une chambre.
- Blaise Pascal

VonStupp

Quote from: stingo on December 09, 2021, 07:51:17 PM
Ooh I like the Dale Warland Singers!

Perhaps the oldest recording I have heard from them, I think.

VS
"All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff."

VonStupp

Hector Berlioz
L'Enfance du Christ

Kopleff, Tozzi, Souzay, Valletti,
Boston SO - Charles Munch


VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
A beautiful work by Berlioz I visit far too little.

I don't have the Munch box, but this recording needed the remastering.

VS

"All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff."

VonStupp

#457
Daniel Pinkham (1923-2006)
Christmas Cantata
Company at the Creche
Kings and the Shepherds
Christmas Eve
Evergreen

Dale Warland Singers - Dale Warland


VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
Daniel Pinkham's choral music here isn't the easiest for me. But his mid-century Christmas Cantata is quite easy to love, and I like its rhythmic medievalisms.

This recording also includes Britten's A Ceremony of Carols in its SATB format, a version which I don't hear as often, but hardly needs to be mentioned since it is so ubiquitous on record.

Most of this album can be found on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81oaBYW-iiw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65RNgokwZEQ

VS

"All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff."

Pohjolas Daughter

Visited Vaughan Williams a few minutes ago (see current listening thread).   :)

PD
Pohjolas Daughter

VonStupp

#459
Bob Chilcott (1955-present)
Rose in the Middle of Winter - 22 Carols

Commotio - Matthew Berry


VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
I enjoy the art of the Christmas carol, and these are all original creations from Bob Chilcott.

Chilcott follows in John Rutter's footsteps, less jazzy and more complex vocal writing comparatively, but he still has a saccharine sing-song quality and highly caloric harmonies, if you enjoy that style.

I was unfamiliar with the British chamber choir Commotio, but was quite pleased, as well as the instrumentalists that come and go throughout.

Most of this album can be found on YouTube as well:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6eTB0bnK_YI&list=OLAK5uy_kpbPvLwbTnIdLYwdmJ-XsJFpVHJH13Yws&index=2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G81-4QnmK7s&list=OLAK5uy_kpbPvLwbTnIdLYwdmJ-XsJFpVHJH13Yws&index=14

VS

 
"All the good music has already been written by people with wigs and stuff."