I'm no Scrooge. I love the holidays, love presents and shopping and holiday parties and trees and lights and wreaths.
I also love Christmas music, and if that means Bing Crosby singing "White Christmas," I'm there. My favorite Christmas recording ever is probably "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" by Harry Belafonte.
Not so much with top 40 pre-packaged holiday songs for me, though -- I prefer either straight-up traditional or a little bit alternative, something with an edge or a twist.
I'll post my iPod's "Holiday" playlist after the jump, but first, a new CD of holiday music by Mindy Smith was released last month, and it's got that slight edge mixed with tradition that I love best this time of year.
My Holiday isn't alt and edgy in the kind of way that means your parents will cry if you play it during Christmas dinner. It also isn't so sweet and bland that you'll go into a diabetic coma after the pumpkin pie, either. The fact that it treads that line is entirely due to its spare production and the warm beauty of Smith's voice. Smith is is generally considered a folk/country singer and the CD claims it's folk, but this holiday CD is more like alternative supper club music with hints of jazz, pop, and country weaving through.
There's both original material and classics, with a taste of her Nashville roots on the standout track "Follow the Shepherd Home" (amusingly typo'd on the CD's track listing as "Follow the Shepherd Dog"). Alison Krauss sings along on a delicate "Away in a Manger," the country-tinged "Silver Bells" actually manages to stand out from the other 45,679 versions of this song that have been recorded over the years, and her poppy (and I mean that in the pure 60s girl singer way) "I'll Be Home for Christmas" is probably my favorite cut.
So, what's on my iPod Holiday playlist? It's under the jump....
I Heard The Bells On Christmas Day - Sarah McLachlan
Not as powerful as the Belafonte version, but lovely
A Winter's Night - Sarah McLachlan
I played this a thousand times in a row last year...
It Came Upon Midnight Clear - Sixpence None The Richer
Glorious vocals...
Rudy - The Be Good Tanyas
Heartbreaking song about a homeless man who dies on Christmas Eve... stunning.
God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen/We Three Kings - Barenaked Ladies & Sarah Mclachlan
Canadians know how to bring the Christmas.
Do They Know It's Christmas? - Band Aid
I'm a child of the 80s, but this one still gives me chills when Bono almost shouts, "Tonight, thank god it's them instead of you."
Silent Night - Sarah McLachlan
Pretty, pretty.
Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow! - Lena Horne
My favorite version of this holiday classic.
It Came Upon a Midnight Clear - Ella Fitzgerald
Used to be my favorite until I heard...
It Came Upon a Midnight Clear - The Irish Tenors
This one totally blew me away both because of its slightly odd melody and the inclusion of some lyrics most nice-nice holiday cheer versions don't include.
Yet with the woes of sin and strife
The world has suffered long;
Beneath the angel-strain have rolled
Two thousand years of wrong;
And man, at war with man, hears not
The love-song which they bring;
O hush the noise, ye men of strife,
And hear the angels sing.
The Holy City - The Irish Tenors
This is what religious music should be.
Happy Xmas (War Is Over) - Sarah McLachlan
The John Lennon classic interpreted by Sarah and a children's choir. Lovely.
I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day - Harry Belafonte
In 1958, Harry Belafonte recorded a stunning version of this Christmas carol in which, upon hearing the bells ringing "Peace on earth, goodwill to men," he sang:
And in despair, I bow'd my head:
"There is no peace on earth," I said,
"For hate is strong and mocks the song,
Of Peace on earth, good will to men."
I don't suppose I'm imagining the bitterness in the voice of Belafonte, who two years before recording this song had met Martin Luther King, who sent the money to bail King and other jailed protesters out of the Birmingham City Jail, who financed the Freedom Rides and voter-registration drives in the South, and who in the same year he recorded the carol joined Bayard Rustin in leading the youth march for integrated schools. If you want Christmas music that means something, this is a damn good place to start.
