{"id":937,"date":"2018-12-25T00:01:48","date_gmt":"2018-12-24T13:01:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/catesings.org\/?p=937"},"modified":"2018-12-25T00:01:48","modified_gmt":"2018-12-24T13:01:48","slug":"advent-calendar-day-25","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/catesings.catespeaks.net\/index.php\/2018\/12\/25\/advent-calendar-day-25\/","title":{"rendered":"Advent Calendar Day 25: Four Carols and an Oratorio"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Merry Christmas!\u00a0 I always find it impossible to choose just one beautiful piece of music for Christmas Day, and this year, I&#8217;m not even going to try!\u00a0 Instead, you are getting four carols and an oratorio \u2013 and it&#8217;s all I can do not to add more, because there are SO MANY carols that I love.\u00a0 Really, SO VERY MANY&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>I love all the things that are going on in this arrangement of In Dulci Jubilo by David Willcocks &#8211; fugal bits, little floaty descants, you name it.\u00a0 It comes together just beautifully, and I love the wistfulness of the ending.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"In Dulci Jubilo (The Bach Choir, David Willcocks)\" width=\"474\" height=\"356\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/iR2wvE7tj8o?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>You can&#8217;t have Christmas without a big descant, and Hark the Herald Angels does have, objectively, the very best of all the descants (even if it&#8217;s a bit of a pig to sing if you are only a part-time soprano like me). Also, who doesn&#8217;t love a good trumpet fanfare at Christmas?\u00a0 (The choir who is trying to sing descants against it without ruining their voices, that&#8217;s who&#8230;) (but seriously, it&#8217;s pretty glorious).<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Mendelssohn: Hark the Herald Angels Sing, brass fanfare by Willcocks (King&#039;s College Choir)\" width=\"474\" height=\"356\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/zkWhfTK037w?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The Holly and the Ivy has always been a favourite carol of mine, and didn&#8217;t fit into my playlist this year, so here it is, in a particularly lavish arrangement by Henry Walford Davies, and conducted by John Rutter.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"The holly and the ivy\" width=\"474\" height=\"356\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Y_7QzgXcSOw?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>You will not often find me approving of a Rutter Christmas carol, but I make an exception for this lovely version of Joy to the World.\u00a0 I think Rutter is at his best when arranging existing carols, and when given someone lets him have trumpets, and here he has both of these things, with excellent results.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Joy to the World arr. John Rutter\" width=\"474\" height=\"267\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/EtVikpuMy6I?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Last of all, something which isn&#8217;t a carol but is yet another Christmas Oratorio, this one by Camille Saint Sa\u00ebns.\u00a0 I&#8217;ve shared this before, because I love it, especially the Alleluia and the Consurge.\u00a0 It&#8217;s very pastoral and sweet, and is quite short by oratorio standards &#8211; 40 minutes, so just about right to wind down to on Christmas night.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Camille Saint-Sa\u00ebns: Oratorio de No\u00ebl (Christmas Oratorio) - Diethard Hellmann (Audio video)\" width=\"474\" height=\"267\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/EpaeGERnEyA?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>And that brings us to the end of our musical journey through Advent!\u00a0 I hope you&#8217;ve enjoyed the music I&#8217;ve shared, and that you have a joyful and stress-free Christmas and a healthy and happy 2019.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Merry Christmas!\u00a0 I always find it impossible to choose just one beautiful piece of music for Christmas Day, and this year, I&#8217;m not even going to try!\u00a0 Instead, you are getting four carols and an oratorio \u2013 and it&#8217;s all I can do not to add more, because there are SO MANY carols that I [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[14,62,90,91,132,176,302,313,330,408,465,491,691],"class_list":["post-937","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-advent-calendar","tag-bach-choir","tag-cambridge-singers","tag-camille-saint-saens","tag-christmas-oratorio","tag-david-willcocks","tag-hark-the-herald-angels-sing","tag-henry-walford-davies","tag-in-dulce-jubilo","tag-kings-college-choir","tag-mainz-bach-choir","tag-mendelssohn","tag-the-holly-and-the-ivy"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/catesings.catespeaks.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/catesings.catespeaks.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/catesings.catespeaks.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catesings.catespeaks.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catesings.catespeaks.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=937"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/catesings.catespeaks.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/catesings.catespeaks.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catesings.catespeaks.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catesings.catespeaks.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}