Christmas 2022
A CHRISTMAS PLAYLIST
(Note: this was published in segmented form on Facebook Christmas Eve)
CALL
THIS PRELUDE: In each of the past three or four Christmases I've come
across Christmas carols performed in unique ways. Now, I am talking
about traditional religious carols. I don't care for the popular type
music context. No "Rocking around the Christmas tree; " or "Silver
Bells" and especially not "Feliz Navidad." This year I went looking for
them and I found seven or eight that I liked. So, with apologies to Ma
Belle Michele, I have organized the special ones I found into a
playlist But for starters here are two from the past couple of years.
The
first I have posted before, and I still like it. The second is just
because it's funny. I hope some folks will join me. In the meantime
enjoy "The Little Drummer Boy" like you may have never heard it before —
with drums.
And here is the second: The
second is for comic relief. Last year I saw a list of someone's
favorites. Something looked a little off in the presentation so I
checked it. I deon't think this is the "Joy to the World" he thought it was. "Jeremiah was a bullfrog …" "Joy to the World"
And now for this year's play list
an experience.
And deserving equal
billing: this is the second one, second only because of the
originality and children in the first. This is six sisters ranging in
age from 19 to 29 singing a carol in (get this) six-part harmony. And
then on to the best of the rest. Meet the Cimorelli sisters.
THE BEST OF THE REST
Billed as the best Christmas song ever heard. 1,000 participants. Over A Thousand People Came Together To Break a Record And Bring This Moving Christmas Hymn To Life. The Piano Guys, Peter Hollens, David Archuleta, and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir get together to sing
"Angels We Have Heard On High."
Come O Come Emmanuel - New City Sessions
New City Church, Macon, Georgia If this doesn't play, here is the link. https://youtu.be/t8TgI8lvC6s
Hark the Herald angels Sing: Junior Garr & The Spirituals perform reimagined traditional Christmas carols! Originally performed in St. Paul’s Cathedral, this London-based choir bring exciting and rhythmic re-arrangements that go beyond the season.
Hallelujah Chorus
is done in many versions; I particularly liked this one. Just like many
who starred in shows such as American Idol, America's Got Talent, and
The Voice,
Lucy Thomas also got her start on a show called The Voice Kids.
In December 2020 Lucy Thomas released Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" and it quickly became her most popular video on YouTube.
The
final best of all the rest. It seems every year somebody does a new
version of Drummer Boy. I'll leave Joan Jett's version to your
imagination. But, how about with African rhythm. This is
Little Drummer Boy (African Tribal Version) - Alex Boye' ft. Genesis Choir.
And that's it for Christmas 2022.
A note to listeners: Somewhere along the line, Google changed its protocols for using videos from YouTube in blogger. As a result a lot of the music I posted has been blanked out. I am trying to catch up but it's a big job so bear with me. Meanwhile here are a couple of new ones from youngsters named Jadyn Rylee and Sina.
Stairway to Heaven
Inna gadda da vida
Scarborough Fair
Is there a song that draws up the emotion in you?
What's the most emotional song you know? What song comes on and no matter where you are or what you are doing you pause if only for a moment to listen and feel the song and the emotion it raises, perhaps a recollection of a memory, or one that marked a specific moment in your life or one that has no personal relevance to you at all, but brings that warm feeling to your body, maybe some moisture to your eyes and you savor that emotion, again, if only for a moment?
What brought this on? I have to start by admitting that for all these years I have been a closet fan of "Grey's Anatomy," a show that admitting, again, often raises some emotion in me. For the past two years an associated show titled "Station 19" has been added to the schedule and appears right after Grey's. It's set in a Seattle fire house and there sometimes are overlapping plot lines. Station 19 comes up to the quality of Grey's, perhaps because Shondra Rhimes is the guiding light behind both. The show tonight was one of the best written of any I have ever seen on television, at least in the regular drama network genre. A wonderfully intricate plot dealt with members of the station experiencing the death of the chief of the entire department and ended first at the funeral, then in a bar at a wake. It raised those emotions. Sitting in silence after it ended thinking about what I had seen, that's when the question about the most emotional music came up.
So at this moment I am starting a search. I poured a glass of single malt scotch, started this document and at this moment going to YouTube to see what I can find.
I will journal the progress if it works.
10:21 pm: Turning to YouTube. OMG thought of the first one before I even turned it on. "Hey Jude," The Beatles. Why the emotion?. Going through a divorce. My 10 year old son discovering the blues. I told him you have play each note from deep inside you. He asked what that meant. So I used this song, explaining to him that Paul McCartney had written it with John Lennon's son Julian in mind as the boy went through his parents' divorce. "Take a sad song and make it better …"
10:34 pm: While the Beatles are here, another one: "Back in the USSR." Explanation as quickly as possible. During Glasnost early 90s a group of Russian musicians joined a group of American musicians on a stage in Anchorage, Alaska. The Soviet rock group Stas Namen which had traveled with the program, was not on the bill, but there was a setup for a rock band on the stage in the background. During the concert a young ( I am talking early high school young) Native boy from the Bethel area performed with a traditional Yu'pik group of singers and dancers and obviously stood out. Later, at the end of the performances in the program, the announcer surprised the audience, announcing Stas Namen. (They had been left off the bill to prevent the audicence from being overwhelmed with a bunch of rock-crazy kids.) They picked up their instruments and started playing. Then abruptly they stopped, someone shouted, and that Native kid came out on stage. Right behind him came the very familiar notes of the song. We all stood, I recall holding hands with people on both sides of me, neither one of whom I knew and tears welling down my cheeks while a rock band from the depths of the Soviet Union rocked out while a Native kid from Bethel, Alaska shouted out the lead vocal. That was emotional.
10:47 pm: You could not have lived through the uproar of the 60s without hearing this song and for me at least it still carries weight."We Shall Overcome." I heard Pete Seeger sing this in Anchorage at UAA.
10:54 pm: Lightening up a bit. This song may sound frivolous to some perhaps but I have never run into a thinking boat person who didn't react to it. The emotion? You probably had to be there. One night in our favorite harbor tavern, late after several jars had hit the bar this song came on the juke box. All of a sudden everyone stopped talking and we started singing along. Commercial fishermen, weekend sailors, professionals of one sort or another, but all with a feeling for the big ocean. "A Pirate looks at 40." When the song ended and the singing stopped, that place fell into contemplative silence and a lot of knowing glances were passed through the brotherhood. "The occupational hazard be, my occupation's just not around."
11:02 pm: While we're on the ocean, there's this one. I can't count how many times I have sung along out loud while driving on dry land. Still looking for that Southern Girl. "Southern Cross," Crosby, Stills and Nash.
11:07 pm : There are so many performances of this song, but has there ever been a more emotional performance than President Obama singing "Amazing grace" at the funeral of a murdered minister.
11:13 pm: While we are in this mood, anybody who knows me knows I love traditional Christmas music. I could make a whole list of emotional carols. So, picking just one. Do you think it might be because I had a crush of the girl who sang it at our church Christmas pageants every year when I was kid? "Oh, holy night," by, who else, the Mormons.
11:21 p.m.: All right, You might have caught a hint about where I am going now from the last one, but if not I will be patently obvious. You'd think anybody recollecting emotional music would go to old loves first. I did, but honestly at first at least I couldn't think of one. I guess that says something about me. I have fallen in and out of love and lost more times than I care to count. Yet right off the top of my head I couldn't think of a love song that drew any emotion out of me at all. Maybe that says something about all those lost loves. As Jimmy Buffett sang in the last chorus of "Margaretville," It's my own damn fault." Anyway as time has gone on two come to mind, and honestly both do draw some emotion from me.
11:29 pm: First, this one though it came along later than the other one. The other one is perhaps a better song to end this on. Here you go: Dan Hill: "Sometimes when we touch." "I'm just another writer still trapped within my truth."
11:33 pm: OK last one (maybe) There is this one. And, yes, it relates to s a single person, there was a Sweet Judy Blue Eyes in my life and I can feel Steven Stills pain over Judy Collins even though it is personal to me as well. Of course, Crosby, Stills and Nash again, "Suite Jude Blue Eyes."
Well, that's it. Even if I am the only one, that's enough emotion for one night (maybe, I still have half of my second single-malt to go). I guess my best hope for this is somebody enjoyed it and somebody perhaps went off into thoughts about songs that touched them somehow.
11:39 pm: I love you, Chris, wherever you are.
And may "Station 19" be renewed for another season.
More music playlists
Even more music and playlists
Sweet Judy Blue Eyes
Even more music and playlists
Sweet Judy Blue Eyes
Labels: Barack Obama, Beatles, crosby stills and nash, Dan Hill, Grey's Anatomy, Jimmy Buffett,Mormons, Paul McCartney, Pete Seeger, Station 19
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It's Friday night. Facebook is pretty quiet. Is anybody ready to rock and roll? I don't care. My unindicted co-conspirator and I have come up with a great category. How many of us have heard somebody cover our favorite songs and sound awful? Everybody, right? Well, once in a while a good cover has come along and that's what we have here. Hope you join the parade. First one is new. From the album Cheek to Cheek where Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga hit some old jazz standards. This first one was done by Nat King Cole. That was the first record I ever bought, a 78.
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