Favorite/must have Christmas CDs!

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Feanaro_s_Wife

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**Bama’s thread got me thinking about Christmas music…and, more specifically, how I always manage to pick the WORST CDs when I buy them, lol.

So HELP ME!

What are your favorite Christmas CDs???**
 
I said in Bama’s thread…The Carpenters Christmas…it is really beautiful.

I like Celine Dion’s over the years, and also Martina McBride…I tend to like women singing Christmas carols more than men, for some reason.

I LOVE Kenny G’s Christmas…it’s a few years old…and it’s great.

NOW comes out with some new ones every year, and they are usually fun for something new and contemporary from a variety of artists.
 
Anything by Transiberian Orchestra! Love it, love it, love it!😃

If you ever have a chance to see them in concert, GO. It is amazing!👍
 
The Boston Pops with Arthur Fiedler A Christmas Festival
The Philadelphia Orchestra with Eugene Ormandy Greatest Christmas hits Both contain classic secular and religious carols and are probably in the cheap bin since they have been around for quite a while.

More contemporary:
Harry Connick Jr. When My Heart Finds Christmas religious (Catholic flavored) and secular classics plus some different ones I Pray on Christmas and Ave Maria.

Diana Krall: Christmas Songs This is my favorite. It is a must have. Krall is one of the best vocalists around.

Manhatten Transfer: The Christmas Album. Great music by the legendary vocalese group.

Joe Pass Six String Christmas Pass is a jazz virtuoso on guitar. All instrumentals done with some swing.

Carole Koenig: Season’s Greetings: Music on the Hammered Dulcimer. Soft, restful and beautiful.

Glenn Miller Orchestra: In the Christmas Mood Big Band arrangements of great Christmas songs.

George Winston: December Solo new age piano. Lovely fresh sounds with some original work and some old standbys.

Bob McNally: Handmade Christmas Music This will be hard to find. Folk/Celtic style instrumental classics.

A Verve Jazz Christmas: Assorted jazz greats doing their thing. I really like it but it is for jazz fans only.

Be sure to get one of the many compilations of Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, and Nat King Cole. Often found in supermarkets or the cheap bins.

Hope this helps. I would definitely go for Krall, Connick and the Transfer.
 
What a wonderful collection…I am in need of something new…and your list is great–thank you.
 
Mannheim Steamroller
Burl Ives
Dolly Parton
Amy Grant
Trans Siberian Orchestra
Reba McEntire
Bing Crosby
Elvis Presley

Okay, you asked for the albums themselves but just about any of these artists/groups have great albums. Lily should love the Burl Ives one, if not right now, then next year! She might really enjoy the Chipmunks one right now, she is just at the age that their silly humor can have her giggling on the floor, I still like listening to them but I don’t have a 2 yo who will insist that is all we listen to for hours and days on end 😃

Do not get The Beach Boys, really, they do be-bop/rock pretty well but not Christmas - I was enjoying their regular albums so decided to get their Christmas one, oh, my goodness, it was awful!
 
Mitch Miller.

OK, so I’m old, and I was a kid, Mitch Miller was on TV.

I also like Andy Williams, and the Ray Coniff Singers. Look 'em up on iTunes.

I have some Bing Crosby, and some Burl Ives, and Nat King Cole. I also have this wonderful woman picked up at Big Lots, last Schwartzkopf, very rich, big voice.

I love Mannheim Steamroller’s Veni Emmanuel.
 
Catholic90 said:
Anything by Transiberian Orchestra! Love it, love it, love it!😃

If you ever have a chance to see them in concert, GO. It is amazing!👍
Click to expand...
OOOhhh, I want to SO bad, but they only come to El Paso (100 miles away) and it’s always mid-week, usually during Thanksgiving week (they’ll be there this coming Tuesday!) and it is almost IMPOSSIBLE for me to get a day off for an overnight stay! DH says maybe next year, if we give my boss heads-up in advance!

My Favorite albums:

Mannheim Steamroller: I like all their albums but “A Fresh Aire Christmas” (the “blue” album) is my favorite… especially their Gregorian chant version or “Veni, Veni, Emmanuel” and their instrumental version of “O Holy Night”. Chip Davis’ original composition “Christmas Memories” (now called “Music Box” or something like that) is one of my favorites as well!

Michael Martin Murphy: “Cowboy Christmas: Cowboy Songs II” Love “The Cowboy Christmas Ball”, “Two -Step Round the Christmas Tree”, “Sleigh Ride/Jingle Bells Medley”, “Ridin’ the Christmas Trail”… and did you know you could polka to “Good King Wenceslaus”?

And I finally found it after more than 30 years: **The Original: Gene Autry Sings Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer! **I grew up listening to this album and have looked for it for years. Barnes & Noble had it and I am a kid again!
 
Josh Groban - Noel is a really good one!
Also, NOW makes some good christmas mixes w/ a variety of stuff on them
 
I love classical and choral music, so I have the album Best Loved Christmas Carols by the King’s College Choir. It is beautiful!
 
Christmas with Placido Domingo

Jewel - Joy

A Very Special Christmas - Various Artists
 
Every single year for many years now I have to pull this out and put it in the car. It truly is what keeps me sane when having to drive in the Michigan winter weather, especially with the crazy holiday traffic.

George Winston - December

There are clips you can listen to, just scroll down on the page.

I lost my CD one year and Christmas just wasn’t the same without it, I really felt like I was missing something.

~Liza
 
Elvis, no really.

Dean Martin’s Christmas Album

The Blue Hawaiin’s (I dont even know if it’s still available)

Oh and of course: The Ray Coniff Singers.

OhOh and Chris Issak’s Christmas Album is great.

Bing Crosby (especially with Bowie on Little Drummer Boy)
 
Not all on CD, some are on tapes but still wonderful!
I started listening to some of them weeks ago!

George Winston, December
Windham Hill’s Winter Solstice I & 2
John McCutcheon,Winter Solstice
Percy Faith, volume 1 (it was my mom’s favorite)
All the Mannheim Steamrollers
The Carpenters, a Christmas Portrait
Joan Baez, Noel
Christmas with the Cambridge Singers
Christmas with the Tallis Scholars (this year’s must have)
Ancient Noels, Maggie Sansone
The Very Best of Celtic Christmas, Windham Hill
A Waverly Consort Christmas
Handel’s Messiah
Hodie, Ralph Vaughan Williams
Noels Celtiques, Ensemble Choral du Bout du
Monde
Sacred Arias, Andrea Bocelli
A Celtic Christmas, Various (A Walmart collection
that turned out to be incredible!)

My biggest musical wish is to find a CD locally (I don’t oder over the internet) of an old Christmas album called Christmas is the Warmest Time of the Year by Ed Ames.
 
FickleFreckled said:
Not all on CD, some are on tapes but still wonderful!
I started listening to some of them weeks ago!

George Winston, December
Windham Hill’s Winter Solstice I & 2
John McCutcheon,Winter Solstice
Percy Faith, volume 1 (it was my mom’s favorite)
All the Mannheim Steamrollers
The Carpenters, a Christmas Portrait
Joan Baez, Noel
Christmas with the Cambridge Singers
Christmas with the Tallis Scholars (this year’s must have)
Ancient Noels, Maggie Sansone
The Very Best of Celtic Christmas, Windham Hill
A Waverly Consort Christmas
Handel’s Messiah
Hodie, Ralph Vaughan Williams
Noels Celtiques, Ensemble Choral du Bout du
Monde
Sacred Arias, Andrea Bocelli
A Celtic Christmas, Various (A Walmart collection
that turned out to be incredible!)

My biggest musical wish is to find a CD locally (I don’t oder over the internet) of an old Christmas album called Christmas is the Warmest Time of the Year by Ed Ames.
Click to expand...
OH YEAH! I have Sacred Arias by Boccelli – it’s lovely.
 
Christmas With the Cambridge Singers
Christmas Night: Carols of the Nativity, The Cambridge Singers
The Christmas Song, Nat King Cole
John Denver and the Muppets: A Christmas Together

It’s funny- clicking on the Nat King Cole link brings up other suggestions, including the Bing Crosby, Andy Williams, and Johnny Mathis Christmas albums that I know my dad still has on vinyl. Ah- those bring back so many memories from childhood: opening presents with Bing Crosby crooning in the background, eating breakfast tamales to Johnny Mathis. 🙂
 
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