It’s not too late for these two stocking-stuffers for Christmas. Both are traditional in their own way.
Do Not Be Afraid, is the sixth and latest musical offering from singer-songwriter and worship leader Glen Soderholm. This CD features 12 songs in a meditative mood, ranging from the intimate plucked strings, violin and piano of “Angels from the Realms of Glory” to the more expansive, but still thoughtful, “Shine,” which calls for the Light of Heaven to “shine on our fading world.”
The traditional Christmas songs on Do Not Be Afraid are wrapped in sounds at some remove from the church choir loft on Christmas Eve. He presents “People Look East,” and “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” in garb more country than English folk. “O Little Town of Bethlehem” to Forest Green, the melody championed by Ralph Vaughan Williams, is clothed not in the harmonies of a church choir but as a piano ballad.
Soderholm offers some original material mixed with the traditional Christmas carols and songs, including the title track, a cover of Carolyn Arends’ “Do Not Be Afraid”. “Seamstress” and “God Bless the Poor” touch on the themes of justice for the overlooked and downtrodden which go back to the earliest stories of Jesus’ birth. “Will You Wait for Me?” is the kind of song that can work both as a solo and as a congregational song for Advent.
Glen Soderholm’s music, and this CD in particular, exerts a kind of gentle strength. I find myself mulling over one of his lyrics or a bit of melody months after listening to his music. This is a collection for those hungering for quiet, inner pilgrimage through the traditions of Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany.
The tradition behind Priests’ Noël doesn’t include the sauciness of, say, the Iona Community, or the down-under tang of a Shirley Irena Murray. This is music of organ and choir loft, music of the cathedral, festal music with soaring voices and schooled harmonies.
The Priests are, indeed, three priests from Ireland: Fr. Eugene, Fr. Martin and Fr. David. Prior to their entering the priesthood, the three singing friends were nicknamed “Holy Holy Holy” by their peers. All three went on to combine theological studies with their vocal schooling, and now work both as parish priests and as a vocal trio, signed to Sony Music and singing for the Pope. Their rich Irish tenor sound is direct and unfussy, without cloying sentimentality, yet full of the sentiment of the season.
Noël offers a generous helping of Christmas fare, from “Ding Dong Merrily on High” (originally a French dance tune) to Katherine Davis’ “The Little Drummer Boy,” which has as long a tradition in French as in English. Their glorious rendition of “Sussex Carol” is in its own way as removed from its roots as a Sussex folk melody—or even from its next home in The Oxford Book of Carols—as are the acoustic retoolings of Glen Soderholm. “In the Bleak Midwinter” captivates, opening mysterioso with drone-and-bell effects, rising to a middle verse driven by insistent strings, and ending in a warm orchestral glow.
Tradition is a word that’s as loaded as Christmas stocking. For some it’s a down-home, rootsy, “gimme that old-time religion” kind of tradition. For others, it’s the music of the big downtown church choir. For still others, it’s the songs of radical reversal, the cry of John the Baptizer and the Magnificat. We need them all: none presents a complete picture and each needs the other to express the many meanings in the traditions of Christmas.
