As We Hear It: Yet Another Christmas Playlist (2022) - Guest post by Allan Folz

Greetings and Merry Christmas Archimago and readers. For new readers, the Christmas playlist is a recent tradition (2020, 2021) at Archimago Musings that had as its genesis recognition that great dynamic range makes for great music, even if you didn't necessarily know it or weren't even looking for it.

It started way back in the 90's. I accumulated a small collection of Christmas CD's which sounded great. My wife and I never tired of listening to them between Thanksgiving and Christmas every year. Several years later I happened across this humble blog and learned about dynamic range, among a great many other things. When I started measuring some of the albums in my CD collection I noticed that all my favorites had pretty high dynamic ranges. Additionally, the albums I bought, only to be disappointed in them after I got them home and had a few listens had pretty low dynamic ranges. One year as Christmas approached I thought I'd test the theory against my Christmas albums. To my pleasant non-surprise I saw that they all scored respectably well on dynamic range. A couple years later it occurred to me to share my epiphany (heh) with Arch and the blog in a guest post. It was well received, so the next year I did another playlist, again with nod to dynamic range.

This year, I am going to break slightly with tradition and won't be overtly covering dynamic range. I trust that's been proven to everyone's satisfaction. Plus, these are albums I discovered from streaming services, and I don't actually know the dynamic ranges. Not to mention, streaming services today often fudge around with albums' loudness since the number one complaint from streaming listeners is loud songs coming after relatively quiet ones when they are listening to mix playlists. The dynamic range of the song you stream is often probably not the same as on the CD you would buy. [Ed: Indeed. Much depends on which mastering is on the streaming service!]

However, we won't be without a theme. This year's Christmas Playlist theme is choral performances. A nice side-benefit of choosing choral music is that with the human voice being the front and center purpose of the performance, a high dynamic range all but necessarily follows.

So without any further ado, let us begin.

Christmas Carols by King's College Choir (Amazon, Spotify, Qobuz, Apple)
2019, 1hr 32min, 32 songs

Kings College Choir is a boys choir with a wonderful organ accompaniment. Last year I chose their Nine Lessons and Carols album from 2012, which is a live recording of their midnight mass. This album is all carols. The carols are mostly a cappella with sometimes an organ accompaniment. There are dozens of King's College recordings from over the years. I won't pretend that I've listened to all or even most of them to find the best one. However, I can say that after several listenings, this is one that I keep coming back to. My favorite tracks on this album are track 1, “Ding Dong Merrily on High” for a beautiful, fully a cappella performance; track 9, “Once in Royal David's City” for a moving organ accompaniment; and tracks 31 & 32 where the organ alternates between pulling out all the stops and toning it down to be back-up to the boys choir. It's a great performance.

Carols from St. Paul's Cathedral (Discogs, Amazon, Spotify, Qobuz, Apple)
1995, 56min, 15 songs

Carols for St. Paul's Cathedral is another boys choir. This album is a stand out for its wonderful mix of a cappella solos and choir, organ-only accompaniments, and full instrumental accompaniment with brass and percussion sections. Each track is slightly different on the accompaniment so it's always changing and keeping my ear interested. The trumpets are especially nice. On the first track they are front and center, reminiscent of a herald for an announcement. Then they are absent on the next track and take a bit of a back seat for a few tracks more, before coming shouting back, almost about the time you had forgotten about them, for the closing stanza of “Joy to the World.” Also, be sure to stay for the closing track with the ringing church bells. Nothing says Christmas like ringing church bells! The song selection, the quality of the recording, and, of course, the artists' performances probably make this the one choral album I'd have, if I could only have one.

Cambridge Singers Christmas Album (Discogs, Amazon, Spotify, Qobuz, Apple)
2003, 1hr 17min, 23 songs

This album stands out for excellent vocals in a wonderful concert hall. Discogs notes it was recorded in the Great Hall of University College School, London. The natural reverb of the voices is amazing. The choir is adult men and women, which is a nice contrast to the first two albums which were boys choirs. If an a cappella choir is not in your listening repertoire, this might be your best first choice. Track 1 might be my favorite rendition of “The Holly and the Ivy” ever. Some of the later tracks do have various instrumental accompaniments, but the fully a cappella ones are my favorite. On the other hand, with 23 songs, maybe a completely a cappella album would lose some of its power and appeal. Track 11, “Oh Holy Night” has a moving soprano section that I love. Similarly, track 16, Hayden's “Messiah” and track 17 “In dulci jubilo” are not to be missed. The Messiah, simply because it's the Messiah performed by an excellent choir. “In dulci jubilo” because of the interesting, almost singing in the round to start, then finishing with a brass horns section in accompaniment. So moving!

Love Enfolds Thee Round, TENET Vocal Artists (Amazon, Spotify, Qobuz, Apple)
2020, 1hr 2min, 22 songs

Changing-up from with first 3 albums, Love Enfolds is more akin to chamber music. Instead of a full choir, it is an ensemble of, I believe, 4-8 vocalists. Like the first three albums, they often sing completely a cappella. However, tracks 2, 3, and most of the tracks on the second half of the album are arranged for a lute accompaniment. On first listening I thought it was a harp. When I looked at the track notes I realized it was actually a lute. Personally, I found the second half of the album the most enjoyable, though to be honest I'm not exactly sure why. Maybe it was the lute. Track 19 “Es ist en Ros' Entsprungen” and track 20 “The Holy and the Ivy” are my favorites on this album. Track 14, “Greensleeves” is a wonderful lute solo. More than once I would listen to the opening track then skip to “Greensleeves” and listen to the remainder of the album from there. This album, especially starting with the second half, is a very nice choice if you want a quiet, contemplative evening, either alone or with a significant other, sipping your favorite beverages and watching a roaring fire.

Bach Christmas Oratorio

I have two choices for you for this classic. The first is a regular CD album. It is a performance from 1987. But make no mistake, they knew how to make excellent recordings in the late 80's. It is very clean. I wish I knew the dynamic range. I listened to a few other Oratorios, but this one I liked the best. I assume the conductor, John Eliot Gardiner, was working hard to get the best from his musicians and vocalists. Additionally, I found the lead soprano brought a little extra something to the performance compared to the others that made this album stand slightly above the others.

The second choice is the Nicholas Harnoncourt concert uploaded to YouTube. (I still rock the Fire TV into my Oppo-105.) Remarkably, the entire 2 and a half hour plus concert is available as a single uninterrupted video. It's also available as a pair of videos split into two movements, 1-3 and 4-6. The YouTube recording isn't the cleanest, but it is still good and watching the expressions on the vocalists with their early 80's glasses and hair styles in choir dress on a Christmas set in a cathedral more than makes up for a slight lacking in sound quality.

The other thing I liked about this video that they couldn't (wouldn't?) do today are the long takes between cuts. Sadly, modern video editors invariably come across as ADHD cases editing for other ADHD cases. While 2 to at most 5 seconds between cuts is the norm today, the Harnoncourt performance is from a time where camera cuts followed the action, rather than try to make-up the action. Most people don't think about it, but when you see it the old way, it's remarkable. And much more relaxing. I probably wouldn't sit and stare at this for two+ hours on a laptop, but if you have a home theater set-up or something akin to it I give this a strong endorsement.

[Ed: Fascinating observation about the rapid cutting in video these days; reminds me of how many of us jump between tracks or just use playlists mixing and matching these days instead of letting an album play out. In this regard, I agree that vinyl is a way to rein this in. ;-)]

John Eliot Gardiner (Discogs, Amazon, Spotify, Qobuz, Apple)

1987, 2hr 20min, 65 tracks

Nicholas Harnoncourt (YouTube as above, or as two movements 1-3 & 4-6)

Unknown year, 2hr 32min
[Ed: possibly this version of Harnoncourt Christmas Oratorio from 1973 available on the Teldec label? Spotify, Qobuz]

Bonus Pick: The Leipzig Chorales, Christa Rakich/Organ (Amazon, Spotify, Qobuz, Apple)
2010, 1hr 38min, 18 songs

The Leipzig Chorales are not Christmas music, but they are in keeping with using the Christmas season as impetuous to stretch the genres of music we normally listen to. In last year's playlist, I suggested a Bach Goldberg Variations 4-CD set and said the organ was my favorite of the four because good organ albums are so hard to find. Christa Rakich & The Leipzig Chorales is a good organ album. I listen to it regularly throughout the year. In fact, I don't often make it to the end of the album, but that's ok. We're here to enjoy the music, not be elitist snobs. I like to think organ music is the original dub. Crank up the bass and enjoy!

Thank you all for reading, and thank you, Archimago, for hosting. It was another great year of blogging and I loved following along. Merry Christmas to all and Happy New Year for 2023. May 2023 be the best yet to come for each of us.

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Thank you again Allan for another instalment of the "Christmas Playlist" series! Fantastic set of music to contemplate the Season with, of which I've just started to scratch the surface at this time and will gradually explore more over the holidays. ;-)

BTW, my dad used to perform in a local choir and is a big fan of Bach's Christmas Oratorio so a few years ago I got the Channel Classics' Jos van Veldhoven & The Netherlands Bach Society 2-disc SACD set (2009 SACD release, recorded Dec. 2002, here's a review). Real hi-res DSD recording with high dynamic range of course (DR12-13 for both 2.0 and 5.0 mixes). The 5.0 multichannel version nicely captured the spacious ambiance at Frits Philips Music Center, Eindhoven. If anyone can find this one on streaming sites, let me know!

Music to close off the year... (Lindsey Stirling "Joy To The World", from Snow Waltz. Spotify, Qobuz, Apple)