The Music That Puts Us In The Mood... for Christmas

 JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas here in southern Maine, where we’re having our first snow storm of the season. That’s good because 1) the Guest Son brought most of the wood inside to the woodroom over the Thanksgiving weekend and 2) it’s been hard to feel like it’s “the most wonderful time of the year” with everything going on. Or more precisely, everything NOT going on. Not going out to stores, not attending parties, not going to church, not seeing The Nutcracker at the ballet or The Magic of Christmas at the symphony.

But we do have a few holiday stalwarts we can enjoy just as much this year as any other. One of them is music.

I enjoy the Christmas classics as much as anyone (or at least, as much as anyone not working retail during the holiday season) but my favorite music for this time of year is a bit melancholy. My favorite carols are medieval and early modern pieces, in minor keys and with lots of voices echoing on stone walls. 

My favorite album for the season is George Winston's classic "December," from Windham Hill. When Ross and I were dating in D.C, I dragged him to a George Winston Christmas concert at the Kennedy Center. I was sitting there, enraptured by the music, when I heard this sound like water backing up in the pipes from the seat next to me. It was Ross, sound asleep. (To be fair, he'd been pulling some pretty late nights as a law student at the end of the term.)

And the song I most love in this season - I feel it's one of the few secular Advent songs - is Joni Mitchell's River. It seems...uniquely right this year.

How about you, Reds? What tunes give you that festive feeling?

RHYS BOWEN:  Not going to the Nutcracker for the first time in 18 years is heartbreaking. My first song of Christmas is always Mannheim Steamroller. But I have been humming various Christmas songs as I bake today. Jolly old St Nicholas and All I want for Christmas is you! Not exactly highbrow. But this is one time of year when I love to play familiar music, from the choir at Kings College Cambridge to German folk carols to Bing Crosby. They put me in the mood. 

 

I’m wondering how much to decorate this year for just John and me?

 

JULIA: Rhys, my vote is for doing it up. Like music, the Christmas decorations we use - inside and outside, are one of the few normal touches we have this pandemic December.  

Jenn McKinlay: Back in the late ‘90’s when I had my first solo apartment in Phoenix with a vintage Merritt O’Keefe gas oven that I had to light with a match (not kidding!), I got really into cookie baking. Everyone one I knew got tons of cookies! I spent most evenings that December baking while listening to The Cambridge Singers which I had just discovered on NPR. This has remained my own personal holiday tradition ever since. As hard as this year has been (mercy!), if I listen to John Rutter’s “What Sweeter Music” while I bake cookies, I am eased. 

LUCY BURDETTE: One thing I will miss sorely this season is singing, and listening to groups of people singing. We’ve often gone to hear a small production of the Messiah in our church, and it’s so lovely and special. So that’s what I’ll listen to this year…

 

And one more truly astonishing performance would be Luciano Pavoratti singing O HOLY NIGHT. That might help me remember what the season’s about and hang on to some hope for next year!

HALLIE EPHRON: I’ll dig out Handel’s Messiah from our piles and piles of vinyl. Way back when, I sang in a choral group so I know the alto part. Which means I’ll want to sing along. Which means it’s a good thing the kids won’t be here because they HATE it when I do that. Then we might dig out our ancient Elvis Presley Christmas album. We’ll definitely tune into a Christmas Celtic Sojourn on Public Radio. And listen to Christmas poems -- The Night Before Christmas and A Child’s Christmas in Wales. (Did anyone listen to Alice’s Restaurant on Thanksgiving?)

 

JULIA: Hallie, yes! It was a favorite of Ross's, and it's a family tradition. "The twenty seven eight-by-ten color glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one..." 

 

I couldn't find a good video of the King singing "Santa Claus is Back in Town," but here's a great rendition by none other than Kurt Russell: 

 

DEBORAH CROMBIE: One of the musical treats of a normal Christmas for me is the Dallas Winds Christmas concert (especially as my friend Gigi is the Operations Director and if I'm really nice I get to go backstage!) They are actually doing a very limited seating, limited band show in the Meyerson Symphony, but they are also streaming, so I've got my ticket for that on the 18th.

Jenn, I LOVE John Rutter's Cambridge Singers. I'll have to dig out my CDs. I will listen to anything Christmasy, but some special favorites are Jewel's Christmas album, and, always, the soundtrack to LOVE ACTUALLY.

 

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN:  Yes, The Love, Actually soundtrack. And yes, the Messiah, which I will sing at the top of my voice. All the parts. I try to sing ALL the parts. (And yes, Hallie, Alice’s Restaurant is a Thanksgiving tradition.)   My favorite carols, too, like Oh Come Oh Come Emmanuel. And God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen. And as Pogo sings, Deck the Halls With Boston Charlie, Walla Walla Wash, and Kalamazoo. Very festive!

 

How about you, dear readers? What's playing on your record player to get you in the mood?