Music for Advent and Christmas

[VonStupp]

Plum Pudding

Felicity Lott
Joyful Company of Singers - Peter Broadbent

VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
I don't think I have ever had Plum Pudding before, but I assume it is like fruitcake in the US?

Regardless, this recording is an old standard for me.

VS

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Plum Pudding

Felicity Lott
Joyful Company of Singers - Peter Broadbent

VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
I don't think I have ever had Plum Pudding before, but I assume it is like fruitcake in the US?

Regardless, this recording is an old standard for me.

VS

There are some similarities.  I've never made it before (can't remember where parents' purchased theirs from), but when you are ready to serve it, you heat it up by steaming it and serve it with a hard sauce.  Here's one recipe for you:

https://www.marthastewart.com/258098/plum-pudding

PD

[VonStupp]

There are some similarities.  I've never made it before (can't remember where parents' purchased theirs from), but when you are ready to serve it, you heat it up by steaming it and serve it with a hard sauce.  Here's one recipe for you:

https://www.marthastewart.com/258098/plum-pudding

PD

Thanks! It looks like food that could require some foresight in long-term preparation.

I've got the booze ready to go; Now...where to find a pound of candied kumquats.   

VS

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Thanks! It looks like food that could require some foresight in long-term preparation.

I've got the booze ready to go; Now...where to find a pound of candied kumquats.   

VS

There are, I'm sure, a number of variants in terms of recipes, so don't fret yourself.  And, yes, from what I understand, it can be made a fair bit ahead (to a lot of time ahead).

PD

[kyjo]

Arthur Honegger
Une cantate de Noël

London PO & Chorus - Vladimir Jurowski

VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
As French Christmas cantatas go, Honegger doesn't work on me as strongly as Saint-Saëns, but I have always liked his choral style.

Another Vladimir Jurowski entry whose whole album is highly charged.

VS

Oh yes, Honegger's is a really inspired creation, progressing from a darkly chromatic opening to a radiant conclusion. And that Jurowski album is fantastic! Despite being a huge fan of Saint-Saëns, I haven't listened to his oratorio yet.

[VonStupp]

Oh yes, Honegger's is a really inspired creation, progressing from a darkly chromatic opening to a radiant conclusion. And that Jurowski album is fantastic! Despite being a huge fan of Saint-Saëns, I haven't listened to his oratorio yet.

Yes, Honegger's is quite interesting and appreciably different than most other cantatas for the season.

If you haven't heard Saint-Saëns Oratorio de Noël, it is a beaut! The whole album on Proprius is on YouTube, perhaps my favorite recording of it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8eId8MPGDU&list=OLAK5uy_mAKk5QRCn37PG8AQtBx1AsGaP7WMbOZuU

https://www.youtube.com/v/_8eId8MPGDU&ab_channel=Brit-MarieAruhn-Topic

[vandermolen]

Arthur Honegger
Une cantate de Noël

London PO & Chorus - Vladimir Jurowski

VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
As French Christmas cantatas go, Honegger doesn't work on me as strongly as Saint-Saëns, but I have always liked his choral style.

Another Vladimir Jurowski entry whose whole album is highly charged.

VS

That's a fabulous CD - all three works.

[VonStupp]

Cambridge Singers Christmas

Cambridge Singers
City of London Sinfonia - John Rutter

VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
A nice survey of choral music through history, with names like Scheidt, Sweelinck, and Victoria popping up, but also Handel, Berlioz, Warlock, Vaughan Williams, etc.

I also like the John Rutter Christmas Album, but the success of that one depends on how you feel about Rutter's treacly brand of carol writing.

Either way, The Cambridge Singers are an excellent ensemble, and the carol arrangements by Healy Willan and David Willcocks were a throwback for me.

VS

 

[VonStupp]

We Wish You a Merry Shostakovich Christmas

VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
There has been a lot of Shostakovich traffic on GMG lately and I happpened upon this blog entry, which tries to pigeonhole Shostakovich into the Christmas season, including some musical examples. Judge for yourself...

https://exhaustiveshostakovich.wordpress.com/2010/12/15/we-wish-you-a-merry-shostakovich-christmas/

VS

[stingo]

Cambridge Singers Christmas

I always play Christmas Night on Christmas Eve! (I'm a rebel that way)

[Roasted Swan]

Now this is a fun Christmas disc......



Great recording and brilliant playing.  My favourite track is the genuinely funny "Russian Christmas Music" - an arrangement by Alfred Reed of very standard jolly Christmas tunes but changed to minor keys and in a "Russian" style.  Skilfully silly!

[VonStupp]

Now this is a fun Christmas disc......



Great recording and brilliant playing.  My favourite track is the genuinely funny "Russian Christmas Music" - an arrangement by Alfred Reed of very standard jolly Christmas tunes but changed to minor keys and in a "Russian" style.  Skilfully silly!

Nice! I bought this one for my horn-playing mother-in-law last year, although I haven't heard it. I'm not in trouble with her, so it must have been alright.   

VS

[VonStupp]

I always play Christmas Night on Christmas Eve! (I'm a rebel that way)

[VonStupp]

Paul Csonka (1905-1995)
Concierto de Navidad

John Rutter
Dancing Day

Rita Costanzi, harp
Elektra Women's Choir

VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
All three multi-movement works for chorus and harp play nicely as bedfellows without just sounding all the same.

Csonka's Concerto for Christmas is a Cuban-flecked work, a little more modern-sounding than the rest, with the final part dedicated to A la nanita nana.

Rutter's early Dancing Day set is a bit bland compared to what he will write later, but the features for harp are interesting, and his setting of Tomorrow Shall Be My Dancing Day is great.

And while Britten's Ceremony of Carols isn't heard too often with an adult women's choir, I hardly need another recording of it. Well sung, all the same.

VS

[Pohjolas Daughter]

We Wish You a Merry Shostakovich Christmas

VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
There has been a lot of Shostakovich traffic on GMG lately and I happpened upon this blog entry, which tries to pigeonhole Shostakovich into the Christmas season, including some musical examples. Judge for yourself...

https://exhaustiveshostakovich.wordpress.com/2010/12/15/we-wish-you-a-merry-shostakovich-christmas/

VS

Thanks, I'll check it out in a bit.  Just put up my Christmas tree (with a lot of help from a friend).  Lots of decorating (and tidying up to do) now.  Trying to figure out what to put on first.   

PD

[VonStupp]

Thanks, I'll check it out in a bit.  Just put up my Christmas tree (with a lot of help from a friend).  Lots of decorating (and tidying up to do) now.  Trying to figure out what to put on first.   

PD

Have fun!   

This is the first year I have had my lights and decorations up (for a while now), the presents are bought and wrapped, travel plans are done, and the figgy pudding is boozed up, steamed, and awaiting next week.

If I didn't have to go to work (and need to clean as well...), this would be the most relaxing Christmas since my kids were born.

VS

[Karl Henning]

Thanks, I'll check it out in a bit.  Just put up my Christmas tree (with a lot of help from a friend).  Lots of decorating (and tidying up to do) now.  Trying to figure out what to put on first.   

PD

Trivia: Shostakovich is not, strictly speaking, putting up a Christmas tree, as the atheist government in Moscow outlawed Christmas. In the Soviet era, people put up New Year's trees.

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Have fun!   

This is the first year I have had my lights and decorations up (for a while now), the presents are bought and wrapped, travel plans are done, and the figgy pudding is boozed up, steamed, and awaiting next week.

If I didn't have to go to work (and need to clean as well...), this would be the most relaxing Christmas since my kids were born.

VS

Thanks!  Am relaxing listening to the Met's broadcast of The Magic Flute whilst putting on the lights.  Almost done with that, but needed to sit for a minute. 

And enjoy your relaxing to VS!

Trivia: Shostakovich is not, strictly speaking, putting up a Christmas tree, as the atheist government in Moscow outlawed Christmas. In the Soviet era, people put up New Year's trees.

Ah!  Didn't know that Karl!

PD

[Karl Henning]

Now this is a fun Christmas disc......



Great recording and brilliant playing.  My favourite track is the genuinely funny "Russian Christmas Music" - an arrangement by Alfred Reed of very standard jolly Christmas tunes but changed to minor keys and in a "Russian" style.  Skilfully silly!

Nice. I met Alfred Reed while I was at Wooster.

[VonStupp]

Christmas Songbook
King's Singers

VonStupp's 25 Days of Christmas
Christmas Songbook tends towards vocal-jazz tinged styles and secularisms versus the earlier Christmas album whose repertoire could easily park directly within the cathedral.

Either way, I enjoy the King's Singers and their ever-changing personnel.

VS