Voices: new recordings for the holidays

A look at several new seasonal recordings...

Alison Brown is known for creating music that crosses borders between jazz, bluegrass, folk, and Celtic, and making all that work with stellar musicianship. That’s the approach she brings to the music she’s chosen for her holiday album. Evergreen.. The Alison Brown Quartet comprises Brown on banjo, John R. Burr on piano, Garry West on bass, David Heyer on drums, and for this recording, guest Joe Craven on fiddle, mandolin, and percussion. They kick things off with Brown’s arrangement of the Carol of the Bells and We Three Kings stirred together in a seasonal mix, and along the way combine Skating (think Charlie Brown) with Feliz Navidad and offer a set of O’Carolan tunes called O’Carolan’s Welcome to Christmas. It all makes for a fine and thoughtful instrumental soundtrack for the holidays

Another instrumental album you’ll want to check out is Appalachian Christmas. The three players, Andrea Zonn on fiddle, Matt McKenzie on upright bass, and Pat McGrath on guitar and mandolin, share a slew of recording and performing credits including work with Dolly Parton, Alison Krauss, Vince Gill, Lee Ann Womack, Alison Brown, and James Taylor. It’s easy to hear why, as on this recording they get right down to the simplicity and complexity of traditional carols and favorite holiday songs. Striping the melodies down to their essence, the musicians make space for old memories to flow and new memories to be born.

Gretchen Peters’ album Northern Lights gets at both the connection and solitude of the winter holiday season, with covers of Kim Richey’s Careful How You Go, traditional songs including In the Bleak Midwinter, and outstanding originals such as Northern Lights and Waitin’ on Mary. Peters talks about the making of the album here.

Tracy Grammer and Dave Carter were one of the top duos in folk music when he died suddenly several years back. The pair never recorded a Christmas album as such, but for several years they were invited to contribute songs to a holiday CD a retailer gave as a gift to his workers. The eight tacks they recorded are gathered in American Noel. Outstanding cuts include Footsteps of the Faithful, a song about seeking and searching for faith, Giddyup Santa, a funny look at a ride with the red suited gentleman, and American Noel, a retelling of the nativity set in modern times. If you like country or folk music, this is one you’ll enjoy.

Mary Chapin Carpenter delivers some fine original holiday songs on her album Come Darkness, Come Light. She starts and ends at different points in familiar music, beginning with Once in Royal David’s City and ending with Go Tell It on the Mountain. The varied moods of the holiday come in for Carpenter’s own consideration in The Longest Night of the Year, Christmas in the City, and Thanskgiving Song, among others. Through it all she sings with a quiet gentleness that well supports her words and ideas.

stay tuned here at Voices for a look at several lasting holiday favorite recordings...what are yours? tell about that below.

you might also like to see Albert & Gage: One More Christmas

You'll find music content from many genres and plenty of other music fans at Gather Essentials: Music. For more of Kerry Dexter's Voices columns, look here. It's published on Thursdays.

Kerry Dexter, Music Correspondent Kerry's credits include VH1, CMT, the folk music magazine Dirty Linen, Strings, The Encyclopedia of Ireland and the Americas, and The MusicHound Guides. She also writes about the arts and creative practice at Music Road and contributes to Fred Bals' Series of Tubes.