Posted on 11/27/2009 4:29:59 PM PST by SamAdams76
Thanks!
Your last sentence is very true. Another example of the tail wagging the dog. A few atheists who are hell-bent on taking the joy out of Christmas for everybody else. While I have known for years that the typical Christmas playlist on radio stations have been sanitized so as not to "offend" the few cranks out there, it appears that they are also on a mission to make Christmas music seem sappy and lame.
Another ten songs at random from my iPod Shuffle...let's take our Christmas music back:
O Holy Night - Dustin Kensrue
Merry Christmas Brother - Gordon Gano
Christmas Must Be Tonight - Joan Osborne
O Come O Come Emmanuel - Sufjan Stevens
Just Like Christmas - Ingo Star Cruiser
Christmas Is Coming - George Winston
100,000 Fireflies - The Magnetic Fields
Parade Of The Wooden Soldiers - The Crystals
Pas De Deux: Variation I (Tarantella) - Kirov Opera
Bells Ring - Nazzy Star
Loved the Christmas album “Three Ships” by Jon Anderson back in the ‘80s. It hasn’t been available for years.
Also like the Christmas album by Asleep At The Wheel.
Can’t stand “Silent Night”. It would be tolerable if people didn’t do a slow slide up the third on “heavenly peeeeee-eeeeeace”.
We are now in the last two days of the liturgical year. The Christian year begins anew on Advent Sunday, which this year falls on 29 November. Advent ("Parousia" in Greek) is a four-week period of penitence in which we contemplate both the Advent of the Lord (i.e. the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem) and His Second Advent (the Second Coming, when this world will end). This period is supposed to be one of penance and prayer, not excess and celebration; unfortunately, the secular Christmas holiday season almost exactly matches Advent on the calendar, leaving many people tired, broke, and wondering what all the fuss is about come 25 December.
Observing Advent instead of the secular "holiday season" is a great way to revive the sacred and special feeling that this time of year is supposed to bring. You can start at Catholic.com's Advent 2009 site, which has the prayers, the Gospel readings, and the traditional observances for each day listed for you. (Note: you don't have to be Catholic to observe Advent.)
As for music: if you want inspiring, beautiful music for Advent and Christmas, locate a traditional Catholic parish in your area and drop in for a visit. (You'll want the High Mass on Sunday morning.) A traditional Catholic mass is prayed musically, by singing the prayers and what music it is! Sacred music by the greatest composers along with traditional hymns and prayers can all be heard for free just by visiting a mass. And if you're not Catholic, that's okay -- no one will proselytize you when you visit, nor will anyone expect you to genuflect, know when to sit or stand, etc. Just come on in, take a seat, and let the candles, incense, sounds, and beauty of traditional Christian seasonal observance enfold you. You won't regret it!
It’s only because they go about blowing up innocents and killing everyone that disagrees with them ... IOW - I don’t shop at Best Buy anyway .....
Who here remembers the song, “Christmas Gift”?
Mission accepted! I loved that song too but it never made it into my collection as it is somewhat of a rarity. If I remember correctly, it was a "hidden track" on one of her albums but maybe I can find it as an MP3 somewhere. I do have the Melissa Etheridge version of that song and while she does a decent job with it, there is a certain cringe factor having something on my iPod by Melissa Etheridge. If I can find the Pat Benatar version, I'll be happy to dump Melissa into the recycle bin.
Ten more of my songs (at random from "shuffle mode")...
Gagliarda - Mannheim Steamroller
Spotlight On Christmas - Rufus Wainwright
Winter Wonderland - Aretha Franklin
Christmastime is Here - Diana Krall
First of May - Bee Gees
Poets + Angels - Ottmar Liebert
Breath Of Heaven - Donna Summer
In The Bleak Midwinter - Crash Test Dummies
Pat A Pan - Mannheim Steamroller
The First Noel - Billy Pilgrim
Their rendition of Stille Nacht (Silent Night) is still the most beautiful cover version of that song I've ever heard.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpeKTGbqABo
The most beautiful rendition of O Holy Night I’ve ever heard.
♪♪♪|♪.♬
sle-eep in Heav-en-ly peace
instead of
♩♬|♩♬♩
sle-ep in Heav-en-ly peace
Arrrgh! Drives me fricking nuts.
http://www.jonanderson3ships.com/
Comes with a Christmas card autographed by Anderson.
“...sloppy sentimentalities of lounge lizards and drunks in bars, who want to pretend that Christmas means something to them.”
Nicely put and very true. And then there are also the lounge lizards who know Christmas simply is not for them.
Sparks - Thank God It’s Not Christmas (1974)
What do I hear, what do I hear?
Chit-chat, and clinking glass
Cheap talk, a lady’s laugh
After hours
What do I see, what do I see?
Some sunken hideaway
Where people go to play
After hours
There I’ll spend the night
Meeting fancy things
At bistros and old haunts
Trying very hard to sin
...
Chorus:
Thank God it’s not Christmas
When there is only you
And nothing else to do
Thank God it’s not Christmas
Where there’s just you to do
The rest is closed to public view
...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UbkDzp5LuY
Namie Amuro - White Light
(Particularly nice on the full screen)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKoM-3TFBEo
Please don't tell me that Chip Davis and the gang are not conservatives! I never really looked into their politics but kind of assumed they were on our side being that they were from Nebraska and Rush was such a big fan of them.
At any rate, their first three albums are among the greatest Christmas recordings of all time. I never get tired of hearing them. However, their more recent albums have been major disappointments to me, especially last year's "Christmasville" which was utter junk and totally unrecognizable from their earlier output. In fact that is one of only two Christmas albums I ever had to junk after buying them - the other one being the soundtrack to the horrible Jim Carrey version of "Grinch that Stole Christmas."
Ten more songs at random from my collection...
Mary Had A Baby - Bruce Cockburn
Winter Wonderland - Phantom Planet
What Child Is This? - Balderas & Osborne
True Believers - Melanie
Country Christmas - Loretta Lynn
Star Of Bethlehem - Angels & Airwaves
Last Christmas - Jimmy Eat World
Skating On The River - Lily Frost
Frosty The Snowman - Jimmy Durante
A Change At Christmastime - The Flaming Lips
No Burl Ives?
That's because the song was written to be sung by a boy's choir. As such, very few singers can make it sound good singing alone.
Small wonder why I like the instrumental cover version from Mannheim Steamroller's first Christmas album.
Do you know the name of the artist?
If you like a capella music, check out http://www.singers.com/christmas/
You can download sample tracks to play in the RealAudio Player.
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