Five Christmas Albums to Check Out in 2013

I love listening to Christmas music throughout the year.  It's joyful, hopeful, and comforting, and that sort of music deserves more than one month of listening!

Last year, I told you about my five favorite Christmas albums. Here are five more albums I recommend to you this year.

1. Sara Groves, "O Holy Night"
You can't go wrong with Sara Groves's music.  She writes so powerfully, so poignantly, and yet, so simply.  This album is no exception.  And for anyone who has almost gone crazy extracting a kid's gift from the package, the new song "Toy Packaging" will make you laugh, and make you remember when you wanted to weep in defeat as you tried to open it.

2. Sufjan Stevens, "Silver and Gold"
No one mixes pure talent, fun, and quirkiness like Sufjan Stevens.  His "Songs for Christmas" collection is one of my absolute favorite Christmas albums.  He followed this up last year with this new collection.  Listen, laugh, and enjoy.  You can download a sample of the album for free here.






3. We Three Kings, "The 12 Songs of Christmas"
This album is a fresh mix of bluegrass, Southern, Appalachian, and Irish-dance, complete with  mandolins, fiddles, and mouth harps.  Yes, I said mouth harps.  When's the last time you heard that in Christmas music?!  And an added bonus: all of the proceeds for this album go support some folks doing great charitable work in Honduras.

4. Folk Angel, "Christmas Songs" (5 volumes)
No surprise here.  Classic and new Christmas songs in a neo-classic folk style.  And it's really great stuff.  They've released five EPs (which you can find at the link above).  You can also download a sampler EP here.






5. Paste Magazine, "Holiday Sampler 2013"
Paste Magazine is a great place to keep up with the latest in music, movies, books, and contemporary culture.  This year they have released this Holiday sampler album.  There are contributions from 14 artists, including some veterans like Nick Lowe and Sufjan Stevens, and some of my favorite new discoveries like The Last Bison and Micah Dalton.

 Enjoy, and Merry Christmas!

A Christmas Carol of Mourning

As news of the tragic shooting in Connecticut spread on Friday, my facebook feed started overflowing with expressions of grief and also, in light of the Advent season, expressions of longing for Christ's return. The horrific events highlighting humanity's deep need for Christ were very much on my mind this Sunday as we sang the Chris Rice lyrics, "Tears are falling, hearts are breaking/ how we need to hear from God," and as we reflected on the miracle of the Incarnation in the words of "Hark the Herald Angels:" "Veiled in flesh the God head see; Hail the incarnate Deity; Pleased as man with men to dwell, Jesus, our Emmanuel."

Then, a friend of mine posted this:



The song is "Coventry Carol", a traditional Christmas carol from the 16th century that probably doesn't get very heavy rotation in most churches' Christmas music repertoire. Why? Because this is a Christmas Carol of mourning, in which a mother laments the loss of her child as well as the deaths of the many children killed in Herod's Massacre of the Innocents. (Read about it on Wikipedia, here). As the story goes (found in Matthew chapter 2), Herod calls on the three magi to find out where the Christ child is, ostensibly so that he may join in worshiping the infant King. But when the magi are on their way back to report to Herod, an angel warns them that Herod's true intent is to kill the baby. The wise men, of course, do not return to Herod, and, in a rage, Herod attempts to solve the problem of a prophesied King by having all children under the age of two murdered. Here are some of the carol's lyrics:

Herod, the king, in his raging,
Charged he hath this day
His men of might, in his own sight,
All young children to slay.

This song is a moving and appropriate response to the tragedies of this weekend, but before seeing my friend's post, I had only a vague inkling that this carol even existed and no idea about its subject matter. As a worship leader, I've found myself wishing for more hymns of longing this Advent, because as much as Advent is a time of hope, it is also a time of deep yearning.  We need songs of mourning and longing, as they provide an avenue for our grief:

That woe is me, poor Child for Thee!
And ever mourn and sigh,
For thy parting neither say nor sing,
Bye, bye, lully, lullay.

 and context for our hope:

A thrill of hope -- the weary world rejoices!
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn!
Fall on your knees; O hear the angel voices!
O night divine; O night when Christ was born.

Christmas Music - The Bad and the Good

I love Christmas time, and I especially love the music.

In theory.

In reality, I cover my ears when most Christmas songs are playing and people think that I'm the Grinch.  But when good musicians make Christmas music then life is good.  Here's what I think is wrong, and right, about Christmas music.

The Bad

Too Much Santa - I don't mind Santa Claus.  I know that many people think that it's evil to tell your kids about an altruistic saint who gives people presents, but I don't.  (So far, exactly zero criminals have traced their evil ways to 'Santa Disillusionment.')  But during the holidays I hear way too much Santa music on popular radio.  While buying groceries I have to endure every single song about Santa, and sometimes different versions of the same song since there are only so many.  The holiday season is bigger than Rudolph, but when you insist on removing religion and deeper meanings from the season you end up with nothing but playful children's songs on the radio.  When those songs lack a bigger context then you have a pretty empty holiday.

The Worst of Pop Music - Studios don't put much effort into Christmas songs.  Pop stars who have no career (or who's career is tanking) are sent into the studio to record cheesy versions of 'Frosty the Snowman' or 'Winter Wonderland.'  The music is derivative.  The singing is dull.  The arrangements are not interesting.  Nothing new is brought to the songs.  Instead, they give us pop music's weakest attempt.  Pop music is bad enough, but when these artists and their studios are not even trying to reach their normal state of mediocrity then we get some really bad music.  I understand why non-Believers hate Christmas when I have to listen to this stuff.  (I would put Mariah Carey's work in this category, but legions of women threaten to descend upon me with blunt weapons when I criticize 'All I Want for Christmas is You.')

The Good

Sufjan Stephens - Everyone's favorite indie star has made some of the best Christmas music that I've ever heard.  According to rumor, he hated Christmas because of its commercialism, but found new meaning in the holiday and then began to love it like he was a child again.  His Christmas work covers some traditional songs ('Joy to the World,' I Saw Three Ships,' etc.) with very good arrangements that are, in my mind, the new "definitive" versions of some of these songs.  And the original songs he wrote for the album are great, too.  It's very inspired music that comes from a man who truly loves the holiday.  The album is called Songs for Christmas.

Yo-Yo Ma - The best Christmas music, as far as skill and composition is concerned, is most certainly found on Yo-Yo Ma: Songs for Joy and Peace.  I don't own many albums with better musicians and better arrangements.  This album brought together some of the finest musicians in the world (Yo-Yo Ma is the most famous cellist alive) and recorded them playing beautiful arrangements of traditional Christmas songs.  I listen to it all year, because the music is just that good.  The songs include old classics like 'Wexford Carol' and 'Wassail Song,' but it also has James Taylor doing 'Here Comes the Sun' and a musical arrangement of 'Happy Xmas (The War is Over).'  I can't recommend a better album for the season.  If I only got to have one Christmas album, it might be this one.

Vince Guaraldi - Guaraldi is the jazz genius behind the classic Merry Christmas Charlie Brown album.  It's great.  If you haven't heard it, try to find some recordings of 'Christmas is Coming' or 'What Child is This' and see if that doesn't put you in the holiday spirit.  If you only remember the music as little kids singing boring songs, then you should really go back and check out the good stuff from Guaraldi's piano.

That's it.  Of course, I could have mentioned certain individual recordings (Bing Crosby's recording of 'Do You Hear What I Hear' comes to mind), but I tried to stick with entire albums.  What albums did I leave out?

Edit: Oops, I forgot one.  In the comment section, Brian reminded me of Andrew Peterson's Behold the Lamb album.  it's very good, and tells the biblical story of Jesus through many excellent songs.  I saw the live performance and it was wonderful.