Libera Dreams

What non-Libera Christmas songs are you listening to this year? Get posting.

I'll start with a surprise one (for me). I really hated this for quite a while and was quite vocal about my dislike (I know, unusual for me). However this year I'm finding myself quite liking it - who'd a thunk it?

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I post the next few every year. I don't apologise because they are worth watching again:

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The only claim the next one has to Christmas is that it was performed as part of King's Festival of Nine lessons and Carols. that's good enough for me:

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Don't know why but I always loved this song. Is it corny?
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Maybe it's because I'll leave in three months to work for over 3 month in Ethiopia??

And offcourse
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All dutch people know this song. From the famous Comedian Youp van 't hek. The singing is awfull, but its a very funny song.

A lot of other songs, but the're to haha sentimental. I'm a christmas person, haha can cry with every song. Oh and offcourse sing along

Interesting choices - I really need to brush up on my Dutch!

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I'm toasting my chestnuts in front of the fire as we speak

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What was that about no Libera?

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Excellent choice sir!


First one? maybe it will grow on me

The next two from Kings, well what can I say. They brought a tear to my eye

And lastly from Westminster & St Paul's

A fine selection indeed.

You have great taste Yorkie

Well, I for one have been listening to carols the whole year.

My absolute favourite has to be the recording of Britten's Balulalow by Edward Burrowes and the choir of St Paul's that Yorkie already posted – that I think has to be most perfect piece of singing I've ever heard anywhere. It's just brilliant beyond what words can describe.

I recently came across a version of Once in Royal David's City from King's which I hadn't heard before – and it's pretty much my favourite one now.

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Then from last year's Nine Lessons & Carols, I Saw Three Ships. I am not the biggest fan of the arrangement, but the soloist has such a happy voice that I find myself listening to this quite often.

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Then Whitbourn's Hodie – not sure about the status of this song as a carol (well the text is "Hodie Christus natus est" but it's still not really a carol, is it?), but in any case it was performed at King's in 2008 and the solo is just hauntingly beautiful. Initially I didn't like the composition all that much, but after listening it a few times I've grown to like it a lot.

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Then finally a song that I also listen quite frequently – it's a Finnish Christmas song, of which this is pretty much the only listeneable (is that a word? ) recording on Youtube. It's such a beautiful and meaningful song that I have to put it here even though it's in Finnish.

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The song tells a story of a little sparrow starving in the middle a freezing winter, and a young girl who offers the bird a seed for food telling him that it's Christmas now. The sparrow flies to the girl thanking her, saying that God will want to reward her one day for her kindness.
Then in the last verse the sparrow tells the girl: "I am not, my dear child, a bird from this from this land / I am your little brother, I came from Heaven". So while being so selfless and generous, the girl had in fact been kind to her own deceased brother.
I just can't stop listening to this song over and over again.

Ofcourse it's still too early for Christmas songs* but I wanted to post this video from last year when I first heard "Carol of the Bells". A really nice a capella version from the girls choir of Winchester Cathedral (from a program I watched thanks to someone on here who gave me the tip )

*joking ofcourse, I've been rehearsing Christmas songs with my choir all month and I recently bought the newly released Christmas album from the Roden Boys Choir and ofcourse I already listened to some songs on it. But not all of them! The full launch of Christmas music I have lying around won't really start until after I get home from singing in the Christmas Eve mass By then I'll post some gems on my Youtube channel as well, and link them here

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My cathedral Gospel choir & I sang this at our last 3 christmas concerts, it was also sang by the Cambridge Singers.

Christmas Lullaby by John Rutter

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Here is one that I have been listening to. Reminds me of something Monks would sing...which in turn reminds me a little of Libera.
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Malibu wrote:Here is one that I have been listening to. Reminds me of something Monks would sing...which in turn reminds me a little of Libera.

That's a rather different take on Veni Veni Emmanuel Thanks for sharing. I didn't like everything they did with it but the flute was very nice

maartendas wrote:

Malibu wrote:Here is one that I have been listening to. Reminds me of something Monks would sing...which in turn reminds me a little of Libera.

That's a rather different take on Veni Veni Emmanuel Thanks for sharing. I didn't like everything they did with it but the flute was very nice

You're welcome. Yeah, it's definitely different, but I like it. I have no idea how I came across it, but I'm glad I did. I listened to some of their other stuff, and I don't like it as well since most of it doesn't have vocals. I must just have something for this style of singing
Tim

Visited an old CD earlier and found some tracks on YouTube:

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And some other classics:

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And finally, to give you an idea of Stephan's solo at the Festival of 9 Lessons and Carols - Stephan didn't have a string accompaniment but had RP on the keyboard (in piano mode)

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That boy who sings Balulalow is amazing. Never heard anything like it.

dani wrote:That boy who sings Balulalow is amazing. Never heard anything like it.

Edward Burrows.

Had a couple of brothers who were also in St Paul's choir (and later formed Boys Air Choir which sang the very first clip I posted). Ed was in St Paul's choir at the same time as another famous Treble - Anthony Way.

And yep, it is fantastic - possibly one of the best ever performance I've heard.