Classical CDs: Christmas 2024

Trio Mediæval: Yule (2L)

Pick of my Christmas discs is this sublime collection from Trio Mediæval on the Norwegian audiophile label 2L, reflecting yuletide’s origins in Northern European pagan culture. Imaginative and idiomatic-sounding arrangements, using, variously, kantele, hardanger fiddle, violin, trumpet, organ, bass and percussion invariably suit the material, and the engineering is stunning: sample the organ sound and drum thwacks in ”Lussinati Lange”, or the kantele in “Josefines Julesame” The group have been performing and recording since 1997, and there’s something unearthly about how the voices of Anna Maria Friman, Linn Andrea Fuglseth and Jorunn Lovise Husan blend. Listen to their unaccompanied take on the “Coventry Carol” and you’ll never want to hear another. An original commission, Andrew Smith’s “Lux” is included alongside the older numbers, fitting in beautifully. One of the best Christmas anthologies you’ll ever hear, handsomely produced and well-annotated.

Uranienborg Vokalensemble: Fred over jorden (2L)

Conductor Elisabeth Holte’s sleeve note to this second 2L disc from this outstanding Oslo choir begins, ominously, with “the world is full of darkness… wars are being fought… children are dying…”, Holte’s point being that Christmas is an emotionally intense season, where “what is good seems better and what hurts feels more painful”. This duality is reflected in many of the arrangements, notably with Kjetil Bjerkestrand's astonishing arrangement of “Kling no klokka” (“Ring the bells”), dark and celebratory in equal measure, with Bjerkestrand and Øystein Moen accompanying on synthesisers. Bjerkestrand’s new version of the popular Norwegian carol “O Jul med din glede” is delicious, as is his “I en natt”, a three-minute hug in musical form. The traditional numbers are equally well-served, the album closing with a traditional Swedish carol. As with Yule, this is something you’d happily listen to all year round, and 2L’s production values are superb.

Jack Frost: A Winter Story Debbie Wiseman, with text written and narrated by Alan Titchmarsh (Silva Screen Records)

Debbie Wiseman’s Jack Frost is as much audiobook as Christmas disc, and this collaboration between her and Alan Titchmarsh recalls Howard Blake’s The Snowman. Combining speech with music is a risky business, but I’m not this album’s target audience. Play this to a young child on a long journey and you hope they’d be enthralled, Wiseman’s catchy, beautifully orchestrated score illustrating what Titchmarsh’s words can only hint at. There’s even a number for soprano to rival “Walking in the Air”, Grace Davidson and a well-drilled children’s choir giving it their all. Titchmarsh’s delivery is engaging, especially when he seems to be channelling fellow Yorkshireman Alan Bennett, and a pair of orchestra-only tracks allow us to hear excerpts from Wiseman’s score unadorned. The disc also includes a Davidson singing a pair of attractive new carols with words by Titchmarsh, though she’s upstaged by Cerys Matthews and her 14-year old son duetting on a retread of “Tell Me, Star”

Ukrainian Christmas Lviv National Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra/Serhii Khorovets, with Solimiya Ivakhiv (violin) (Naxos)

This is an entertaining curio, a choir-free disc of Ukrainian carols arranged for full orchestra and solo violin by composer Bodan Kryvopust. The melodies are fabulous, my favourites being “New joy has arisen”(sounding a little like Vaughan Williams) and the lively “Glory to God in the highest”. “A peacock strolls” and “Malanka” have a melodic and rhythmic quirkiness reflecting their folky roots and “Evening of plenty, evening of goodness”, a traditional New Year’s carol is an introspective, rousing closer. Violinist Solimiya Ivakhiv plays well, as does Serhii Khorovets’ Lviv National Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra. Buy this for the tunes, then track down the choral versions on YouTube.

John Rutter: Brass at Christmas Black Dyke Band, Sheffield Philharmonic Chorus/Nicholas Childs and Darius Battiwalla (Naxos)

A sizeable choir makes several appearances on this disc, though most of the John Rutter carols collected here are heard in new arrangements (most by Luc Vertommen)for brass band. I’m no Rutter expert so was surprised at how many of these tunes I recognised. Many are now repertoire standards, and it’s easy to overlook Rutter’s status as one of the UK’s most popular living composers. The earliest carols here date from the 1960s: compare 1965’s popular “Shepherd’s Pipe Carol” with 2004’s “Rejoice and Be Merry” and the quality is consistent, Rutter’s gift for a singable tune never letting him down. The Black Dyke Band play magnificently under Nicholas Childs and Darius Battiwalla though the album really comes alive in the three numbers where they’re partnered with the Sheffield Philharmonic Chorus. 1988’s compact “Te Deum” is an appealing work, and the voices let rip in “O Clap Your Hands”. Rutter’s arrangement of “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” makes for a fun finale. 

News of Great Joy Choir of St John’s College, Oxford/David Bannister (Resonus)

News of Great Joy celebrates the 60^th anniversary of composer Elizabeth Poston’s Penguin Book Of Carols, a 1965 collection inspired by Vaughan Williams’ 1928 anthology. Poston knew Vaughan Williams well and both composers are represented here, along with carols by Imogen and Gustav Holst, Britten, Elizabeth Maconchy and Peter Warlock. David Bannister’s Choir of St John’s College are especially winning in the unaccompanied numbers: “In the Bleak Midwinter” is gorgeous, and they negotiate the tight corners in Maconchy’s tricksy “There is no Rose” with aplomb. Other high spots include a lovely version of Britten’s “Corpus Christi Carol” and Richard Rodney Bennett’s “Puer Nobis”. Potton’s charming “Jesus Christ the Apple Tree” was new to me, and the disc closes with a radiant take on Bob Chilcott’s “The Shepherd’s Carol”. Beautifully recorded too, the acoustic of  the Balliol College chapel lending proceedings a warm glow.

Winter Light: Music by Joanna Forbes L’Estrange (Signum)

This is a winter album as much as a Christmas album, 19 numbers concerned with “light conquering darkness, good overcoming evil and love conquering all”. The first twelve numbers form a neat sequence narrating the Christmas story and is very much a family affair: nine of them are by Joanna Forbes L’Estrange, plus two by husband Alexander L’Estrange and one by son Harry. Alexander’s “Isaiah’s Prophecy” is a real discovery, Richard Gowers having fun with the catchy organ accompaniment, and Joanna’s “Jesus Christ is Born” is equally lively. Do hear her setting of “In the Bleak Midwinter”, Imogen Parry’s pure-toned solo soprano line with Olivia Jageurs on harp. Non-nativity tracks include the jaunty “The Three Wise Women”, channelling the Andrews Sisters, and a wife/husband penned set of Winter Songs commissioned by the Finchley Children’s Music Group. As sung by the altos and sopranos of London Voices, they’re immediately appealing, “Reality Check” and “Presence” setting sharp, witty lyrics (“You can’t wrap a hug on wrapping paper/You can’t put a ribbon on a smile”) to irresistibly catchy music. A hugely enjoyable album.

Here’s Bernard Hughes’ selection:

Benjamin Appl: The Christmas Album Benjamin Appl (baritone), Regensburger Domspatzen, Münchner Rundfunkorchester/Florian Helgath (Alpha Classics)

A bumper selection of Christmas releases – and there are at least as many again that I didn’t get to. I’ve focused more on the new compositions and off-the-beaten-track repertoire, but will start with something fairly mainstream: the German baritone Benjamin Appl offers largely familiar Christmas fare from Germany, Austria, America, Sweden and France – and even a couple of doses of our own John Rutter. He is accompanied by the pre-eminent children’s choir, the Regensburger Domspatzen, and accompanied by a range of instrumental colours, from the Münchner Rundfunkorchester to his own mother on guitar. Appl is at his best in the movements from Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, familiar territory for him, and he is also good in Cecile Chaminade’s less well known "Le Noël des Oiseaux" – but the less said about his “Have yourself a merry little Christmas” the better, perhaps.

Edward Nesbit: Nativity The Choir of King’s College London/Joseph Fort (Delphian)

The first of two excellent releases by Delphian is Edward Nesbit’s album Nativity, Christmastide music by him from the last 10 years. The album’s title-piece is intriguingly scored for soloists, chorus, harp and horn and starts with a vigour that propels much of the piece, often in Britten-esque vein (and there can’t be much higher praise for music of this sort), the faster movements nestling between recitatives and gentle lullabies. The Choir of King’s College London are in good voice, ably supported by Anneke Hodnett (harp) and Martin Owen (horn). The other items take medieval texts and clothe them in a contemporary choral language that I find very rewarding, whether the Wycliffe Carols or the Four Christmas Lyrics, of which the rollocking “Abowt the fyld thei pyped full right” is the standout.

Gabriel Jackson: The Christmas Story Choirs of Merton College Oxford, Oxford Contemporary Sinfonia/Benjamin Nicholas (Delphian)

Gabriel Jackson’s The Christmas Story, also from Delphian an commissioned by Merton College Oxford, is an extended, disc-length setting of liturgical and poetic texts that span from Advent, through Christmas, to Epiphany and Candlemas. It is epic in conception, and unusual for a piece this size in being entirely choral, without solo voices, although with solo instruments fulfilling a similar function. The accompaniment, by the Oxford Contemporary Sinfonia, has three trombones, giving it often the flavour of Stravinsky’s Mass. There is a prominent part for alto saxophone (Sam Corkin), who dances around the choral lines offering a kind of musical exegesis. Also important in the texture is Chris Brannick’s percussion, not a common timbre in liturgical music, but very welcome here. The music has Gabriel Jackson’s signature weightiness, blocks of chordal material alternating with melismatic melodies. The scale of the music and sweep of the text is cinematic and monumental – and it builds to a powerful and light-suffused final section, “O nata lux de lumine”.

Christmas with the Bevan Family Consort Bevan Family Consort/Graham Ross (Signum)

The Bevan family is not like mine, or I guess any others, in that when they gather round to sing Christmas music it doesn’t mean a lusty but approximate bash through “O come all ye faithful”. Rather it means a programme taking in the polyphonic glories of Palestrina, Weelkes and Victoria, alongside some more traditional carols (such as “The Holly and the Ivy”), sung by 14 members of the extraordinary Bevan family. There are apparently 53 singing members of this extended family, but here we just get the best of the best, their blend suggesting none of the squabbling or one-upmanship that characterises many family enterprises. The centrepiece is Palestrina’s Missa Sine Nomine a5, not a Christmas piece but never previously recorded, sung lusciously here in Francis Bevan’s new edition. The more seasonal fare come between the movements of the mass and offer some variety – I loved the purity of John Joubert’s "There is no rose", the bounce of Peter Warlock’s "Benedicamus Domine", and the premiere recording of Imogen Holst’s lovely "The Virgin Unspotted". There’s maybe not overmuch Christmas levity in this album but it’s never less than excellent.

Music for a Christmas Night RIAS Kammerchor Berlin/ Hans-Christoph Rademann & Uwe Gronostay (Harmonia Mundi)

For a survey of choral music styles from the 16th to the 20th century through the lens of Christmas repertoire, the RIAS Kammerchor Berlin’s Music for a Christmas Night is hard to fault. A double-album reissue of CDs from 2002 and 2013 it includes familiar names like Mendelssohn, Bruch and Brahms to new (to me) composers like Johann Eccard and Friedrich Silcher. The RIAS Kammerchor have real range – compare their contemplative Arvo Pärt Magnificat with the chromatic richness of Poulenc’s Quatre motets pour le temps de Noël. There are not too many very familiar items – give or take the odd "Stille Nacht" and "In dulci jubilo" – but Michael Praetorius’s "Es ist ein Ros entsprungen" is always worth hearing.

Yuletide Treats Duo Pleyel (Linn)

And to finish with perhaps my favourite, a real gem. I have recently been enjoying multi-hand piano music, so I was ready to like Duo Pleyel’s Yuletide Treats, and I really did. Alexandra Nepomnyashchaya and Richard Egarr offer The Nutcracker and two movements from Messiah, which are both great, but their opener is a stop-you-in-your tracks bit of Liszt – but not the all-guns-blazing, notes everywhere Liszt. Instead, this Christmas Tree Suite is restrained, delicate, sympathetically played and utterly captivating. My single best musical discovery of this year.

And a couple from Sebastian Scotney:

Jardins d’Hiver Lucienne Renaudin Vary (trumpet), Orchestre de Chambre de Paris/Sascha Goetzel (Warner Classics)

“My role model was Alison Balsom, says Lucienne Renaudin Vary. “She opened up paths for women that weren’t there before.” The French trumpeter, born just outside Nantes in 1999, is currently on a roll, or, more accurately on an eight-date tour of major German concert halls playing the Hummel concerto and extracts from this potpourri of a disc, drawn together by the ideas of gentleness, “hygge” and winter warmth. We hear a soupy arrangement of Charlie Chaplin’s “Swing High Little Girl” which has been the lead single and video. “Everything Happens to Me” is also at ballad tempo – and we can just about hear Renaudin Vary’s timid singing voice, overbalanced by the orchestra. “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” is even slower. Bach’s B minor “Badinerie” is there too, but at stroll-in-the-park tempo compared to Balsom or Maurice André.The most satisfying track is Bach’s “Erbarme Dich”. The gloriously expressive violin-playing of Deborah Nemtanu melts the heart. 

Windborne: To Warm The Winter Hearth (Wand’ring Feet Records )

The New England-based vocal ensemble Windborne has the strap-line “Old Songs; Bold Harmony”. Their new album “To Warm The Winter Hearth”, which they will be touring and workshopping in the UK in late January and early February, is “a collection of welcoming wassails, songs of solstice and music for midwinter, performed in English, Occitan and Lithuanian.” There is always a particular kind of unapologetic urgency about their vocal delivery. When things start off innocently as in “The Cherry Tree Carol”, it is not long before scrunching dissonances remind the listener that these songs – and by inference the world in general – are about anything but sweetness, complacency or reassurance. The high commitment level and persuasiveness of the four singers –  Lauren Breunig, Jeremy Carter-Gordon and Lynn and Will Rowan –  runs through everything they do.

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