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A Christmas Carol Playlist blogshop

Submitted by rickeyre on

Many of the albums featuring songs I have listed in the A Christmas Carol Playlist series can be purchased through amazon.com

I have set up a section in my blogshop where the CDs can be purchased. Take a look at my Christmas Blogshop. I earn a commission on any sales made via my website, and seeing as I intend to ensure my websites pay their own way in 2007, I would appreciate your support :-)

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A Christmas Carol Playlist 7: Wassail matter with you?

Submitted by rickeyre on

I finish this series with that most English (and most secular) of Christmas traditions, the wassail. It's such an integral part of Christmas that Dictionary.com made wassail its word of the day for December 24.

Here's a recipe for wassail I googled earlier.

So as Christmastide rolls on towards New Year, here is my Wassailing playlist - mostly traditional wassailing songs, and finished off with a delightful Christmas single from 1992 which sounds like it was the outcome of too much wassailing.

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Christmas carol odds and sods

Submitted by rickeyre on

On the fourth day of Christmas, I think it's time to wrap this series up, and not in either Christmas wrapping paper or swaddling clothes either.

But before I do ACCP7, there's a few odds and sods that I haven't pulled together into one theme, and unless I get some inspiration between now and Epiphany, I'll leave them for another year to germinate. I hadn't even contemplated the Christmas Oratorios of JS Bach until Al Sharpton made the following pronouncement:

"What James Brown was to music in terms of soul and hip-hop, rap, all of that, is what Bach was to classical music."

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A Christmas Carol Playlist 6: The Final Cut (Subversive Mix)

Submitted by rickeyre on

It starts curiously enough, and takes a sharp turn into the bizarre about half-way through. (And no, this is not the final playlist in this series...)

  1. "I'll Be Home For Christmas" Johnny Cash
  2. "O Come O Come Emmanuel" Sufjan Stevens
  3. "Joy To The World" The Jambalaya Cajun Band
  4. "Santa Claus Got Stuck In My Chimney" Ella Fitzgerald
  5. "O Come All Ye Faithful" Twisted Sister
  6. "Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer" Dr Elmo
  7. "You're A Mean One Mr Grinch" Aimee Mann
  8. "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" The Klezmonauts
  9. "Deck The Halls" William Hung
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A Christmas Carol Playlist 5: The Final Cut (Easy Listening Mix)

Submitted by rickeyre on

A shorter playlist than the one that comes next, but a neat mix of traditional choral performances with some ever-so-unexpected American jazz/blues/folk artists. Five religious numbers and five secular ones:

  1. "O Come O Come Emmanuel" Tonus Peregrinus
  2. "What Child Is This" Mahalia Jackson
  3. "Joy To The World" Joe Williams
  4. "For Unto Us A Child Is Born" (GF Handel) The Cambridge Singers/John Rutter
  5. "Good King Wenceslas" The Sixteen And Harry Christopher
  6. "The Holly And The Ivy" Anonymous 4
  7. "White Christmas" Louis Armstrong
  8. "I'll Be Home For Christmas" Aimee Mann
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Getting upsot with Fanny

Submitted by rickeyre on

A day or two ago
I thought I'd take a ride
And soon Miss Fanny Bright
Was seated by my side
The horse was lean and lank
Misfortune seemed his lot
We got into a drifted bank
And then we got upsot

- second verse of Jingle Bells, James Pierpoint, 1857

Not only does "Jingle Bells":
(a) have no reference to the birth of Jesus Christ, and
(b) depict a rather salacious situation in the second verse, climaxing with a non-existent adjective, but
(c) it's not even a Christmas song!

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