Gifts of Winter: 5 recordings to explore

Reflection and creativity are both part of winter, and of the Advent season.

With those two things in mind, here is a bit about several long time favorite recordings which go along with winter time.

Seasonal music not your thing? No worries, there will be more to come of non seasonal new releases and old favorites, good for holiday gift lists as well. Also check out the links toward the end of this piece...

The title track of Cara Dillon’s album Upon a Winter’s Night was written by Cara’s musical partner and husband, Sam Lakeman, and their son Noah. It’s a piece which evokes, among other things, the ideas of changes and celebration which go along with the Christmas story. It has a lively chorus to which you may find yourself singing along, as well. There is also outstanding uillean pipe contribution from Jarlath Henderson.

There are two more original tracks along with a selection of well known and perhaps lesser known songs on the recording. There is one piece in Irish, Rug Muire Mhac Do Dhia, and a fine take on O Holy Night for which Cara is joined by her sister Mary Dillon. Sam plays guitar or piano or bodhran on most tracks and several other musical friends sit in, including Niall Murphy on fiddle and James Fagan on bouzouki. Cara Dillon brings to this music a bit of the stillness and the joy of winter in her native Northern Ireland.

Matt and Shannon Heaton make their music at places where the music of Ireland and the folk traditions of North American music intersect.

On their album Fine Winter’s Night this is well in evidence with song and tune both reflective and upbeat. Both Heatons song and both write songs; hearing them trade lead and harmony on songs both traditional and original is one of the things to enjoy about this recording. Each is a fine player and a composer of tunes as well, which you will hear, for example, on Dust of Snow, and in their version of the Shetland tune Da Day Dawn. Shannon’s principal instrument is the flute, Matt’s are guitar and bouzouki.

You hear those on the tunes of course, and they well know how to weave their gifts on their instruments into songs as well. Shannon’s title track Fine Winter’s Night is a fine recognition of the brilliance of cold winter nights and the welcome of warmth within. In First Snowfall of December Matt draws listeners in to a tale of Victorian era New England Christmas time. The duo offer well known songs too. While keeping to the spirit of the season, they give carols including O Little Town of Bethlehem and It Came Upon the Midnight Clear a fresh dusting of creative ideas.

Kathy Mattea has two wintery albums out. Good News and Joy for Christmas Day.

On Good News, there are two songs form the tradition, Christ Child Lullabye from Scotland (with Scottish troubadour Dougie Maclean joining in) and and Brightest and Best. The eight contemporary cuts include Mattea’s own memorable Somebody Talkin’ About Jesus, along with the haunting title track written by Ron Mahes. and perhaps the best known songs from the album: Mary Did You Know? and New Kid in Town.

On Joy for Christmas Day, Mattea puts her own thoughtful stamp on O Come O Come Emmanuel, and offers a Christmas Collage of carols, featuring the guitar and arranging skill of her longtime guitarist, Bill Cooley. The eleven tracks are a mix of traditional and contemporary music for Advent and Christmas time. Among them are When the Baby Grew Up, O Come, All Ye Faithful, and the reflective Straw Against the Chill

Emily Smith chose a mix of traditional and contemporary music for her album Songs for Christmas, too. Smith comes from Scotland and is a fine songwriter as well as a singer and player of accordion, piano, and guitar. She’s joined by her musical partner and husband Jamie McClennan who plays guitar, fiddle, and is a singer and songwriter as well. Their musical journey winds from historic carols to contemporary Americana to Scotland based stories. All are well worth repeated listening. That said, listen out especially for Little Road to Bethlehem, Christ Has My Hairt, Ay, and Smith’s originals Find Hope and Winter Song.

Each of these albums is a winter season classic, well worth your listening for musicianship, creativity and, indeed, grace of the season.

Image by Jerzy Górecki from Pixabay

You may also enjoy
Three more albums of winter, from Jay Ungar and Molly Mason, Hanneke Cassel, and April Verch and Joe Newberry.
First story of this season’s holiday gift ideas: Albums from Sarah McQuaid, the Spell Songs Singers, and the band Staran
A story about A candle in the window, at Perceptive Travel
Music for Starry Winter Nights, at Wandering Educators
Second in this season’s holiday gift ideas: music from Graham Rorie, David Milligan, Karine Polwart
Advent: music, silence, and winter

In times when you are able to listen to much music at no cost, take this as a gentle reminder that if you enjoy this music, help support the work of these artists and the cause of good, thoughtful music everywhere by purchasing their music and merch. Direct purchase from an artist’s site is one way. Bandcamp is also a platform which supports artists’ work.

Speaking of support, if you’re in a position to do so this holiday season (and beyond), your support for Music Road is most welcome. Here’s one way:

-->Your support for Music Road is welcome and needed. If you are able to chip in, here is a way to do that, through PayPal. Note that you do not have to have a PayPal account to do this. Thank you.

and another choice:

You can also

Holiday gift ideas: 3 Albums for the Winter Season

Winter: it is a season of celebration and quiet, of gathering and solitude.

Music goes along with all of those things. One of the great things about music is that it may be enjoyed alone and in company.

With those thoughts in mind, here are further ideas of music for your holiday gft list, for yourself or others.

For the album A Fiddler’s Holiday, Jay Ungar, Molly Mason, Ruth Ungar, and Michael Merenda join up with the Orchestra of the University of Mary Washington in Virginia for a seasonal and holiday themed excursion.

There are songs quiet and fast paced, about a snowstorm, the harvest, a silent night in a famialr way snd as a two step, a Quebecois medley about children’s toys, Jay’s classic tune Ashokan Farewell, and more. If you or or someone you know is celebrating Chanukah, the song in this could be a great song for to share. If that holiday is not in your tradition or if the days of celebrating it are past when you read this, I think you will still enjoy this lively song.

The recording on which you will find it is called A Fiddler’s Holiday. There is a dvd available of the live concert, too.

Hanneke Cassel offers a reflective look at Advent and the winter season as she pairs O Come O Come Emmanuel with her original tune Star of Wonder.This is the title track from her new Christmas album O Come Emmanuel.

The music is a selection of original, traditional, and contemporary tunes and songs of faith and of the winter season, led by Hanneke’s fiddle, with contributions from musical friends including Christopher Lewis, Keith Murphy, Yann Falquet, Mike Block, Jeremy Kittel, Jenna Moynihan, Casey Driessen, and Tim Downing and selection of guest singers including Helene Blum, Luke Bulla, Jennifer KImball, and Aoife O’Donovan.

It is Cassel’s fiddle which illuminates each track, however whether leading tunes such as The Snow March or surrounding and supporting singers such as on a thoughtful and creative arrangement of Silent Night, with words sung in several languages.

Cassel is an award winning player, composer, and educator, a past US Scottish National Fiddle Champion who has taken her Celtic rooted music across the world. She is also a woman of strong faith. It’s been a longtime dream of hers to create a Christmas album. She felt this year was the right moment. Take a listen, takee several, in fact, to each of the ten tracks on O Come Emmanuel, to hear why she is right about that. Uplifting, reflective, creative, hopeful, O Come Emmanuel is a Christmas classic, and a fiddle classic, in the making.

April Verch and Joe Newberry decided this was the right year for a holiday album too, and they were alos right about that. Verch, who comes from the Ottawa Valley in the Canadian province of Ontario, and Newberry, who draws on Ozark and Appalachian roots, intertwine those musical sources to great effect on their album On This Christmas Day. Joe Newberry plays banjo, guitar, and fiddle; April Verch plays fiddle and stepdances. They both sing, and they both write songs. Most of the songs on this album are originals, in fact, joined by a few well chosen covers.

It might be a bit of a challenge to write a Christmas song, given all the seasonal music already in existence. It’s a challenge each artist meets well though, creating music that explores by turns the joy and mystery of the holiday season. Though they come from different geographic areas, both Joe and April grew up with Christmas traditions celebrating home and hearth, traditions they continue to celebrate and enjoy. For several years they’ve been doing holiday season tours together. On This Christmas Day is the first time they have put the seasonal music on record, though.

Warm and welcoming, with top class musicianship and songwriting, the album will make a great choice for your own music library and as a lasting gift for friends who enjoy bluegrass and old time music along with excellent singing and playing.

Here is the title track from On This Christmas Day. Joe wrote it after soundcheck in a restored church in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

There’s more to come here along the music road, both gift ideas and seasonal favorites old and new to enjoy. Stay with us as the season unfolds.

You may also enjoy
On this Christmas Day at April Verch’s web shop
First story of this season’s holiday gift ideas: Albums from Sarah McQuaid, the Spell Songs Singers, and the band Staran
Hanneke Cassel’s website
Music for Autumn’s Landscapes at Wandering Educators
Second in this season’s holiday gift ideas: music from Graham Rorie, David Milligan, Karine Polwart
Jay Ungar and Molly Mason’s website

Photograph by Jill Wellington

In times when you are able to listen to much music at no cost, take this as a gentle reminder that if you enjoy this music, help support the work of these artists and the cause of good, thoughtful music everywhere by purchasing their music. Direct purchase from an artist’s site is one way. Bandcamp is also a platform which supports artists’ work.

Speaking of support, if you’re in a position to do so this holiday season, your support for Music Road is most welcome. Here’s one way:

-->Your support for Music Road is welcome and needed. If you are able to chip in, here is a way to do that, through PayPal. Note that you do not have to have a PayPal account to do this. Thank you.

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Advent: Season of Hope -- and Music

Advent.

A season of darkness, a season of light

A season of connection, a season of solitude

A season of waiting, a season of hope

A season for trust, a season of reflection

Event if the liturgical season of Advent is not part of your faith calendar. it’s likely you’ve felt some of those things in the weeks and days leading up to Christendom’s major holiday.

Music is a good doorway, and makes a good companion, as you experience such things.

Several ideas to go along, and links to stories you may wish to explore, too

Three albums for the winter season: a longtime favoorite from The Jay Ungar and Molly Mason Family Band, along with new (winter 2021) releases from April Verch and Joe Newbery, and Hanneke Cassel

Cherish the Ladies have three Christmas albums and their guitarist, Mary Coogan, has a solo Christmas album as well

Shannon Heaton, Mary Black, Cathie Ryan, and Hanneke Cassel talk about their favorite Christmas albums.

Heidi Talbot,Patty Larkin, and Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh continue that conversation about favourite music to hear at the hlrldays.

Do you know the story of the candle in the window at Christmas time? Music to go along too.

One of my favorite winter and Christmas albums: Fine Winer’s Night from Matt and Shannon Heaton.

An excellent Christmas album from Scotland and an album from an Indiana based artist that isn’t seasonal, but has songs which value hope, faith, and community: music from Emily Smith and Carrie Newcomer

May these stories and the music and ideas in them be good comanions to you this winter season.

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Music of Winter: Hope, Faith, and Frames -- Songs from Emily Smith and Carrie Newcomer

Advent: it is a time of preparation, reflection, of turning of season. At times those things -- the silence, the stillness, the preparing of hearts and souls and minds for the miracle of Christmas -- is lost or at least pushed aside by the rush of day to day life and concerns.

Yet, one of the big lessons of Advent, and of winter, for that matter, is the persistence of hope. Faith and hope at times seem at odds. At other times it is clear they are interwoven. Whatever your faith, whether Advent on the calendar forms part of it or not, this is a season for seeing beyond the tinsel and the lights -- and for seeing the lights and the tinsel as pointers to and reminders of hope.

That is an idea Emily Smith explores in her song Find Hope. You may find it, and other excellent songs, on her album Songs for Christmas.

It is an opportunity to consider how we frame things, at Christmas and through the year, too. That is an idea Carrie Newcomer muses on in her song A Shovel is a Prayer.

You may find the song on her album called Live at the Burskirk Chumley Theater.

You may also wish to see
Emily Smith: Echoes
Candle in the Window
Songs of Hope
Music for the Heart of Winter: Cathie Ryan
Music and Mystery: Conversation with Carrie Newcomer

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Late Winter, Christmas, and Music

Late winter, leading up to Christmas, is a time that calls to flurries of activity and travel, preparation and celebration, even as it calls equally to reflection and quiet. Music, specifically of the season and otherwise, is always a good companion and a fine gateway to all these things. For a moment in the midst of hurry or for a longer time in the silence of night and morning, let the work of these musicians be you companion and guide.

Allow this music to renew your hope and peace and joy...

Wintersong, from New England based quartet Rani Arbo and daisy mayhem offers joy, sadness, reflection, exuberance, and good questions. All of this is framed in great harmony, fine lead singing, and top class playing on fiddle, bass, guitar, and percussion. There’s a lively treatment of Jesse Winchester’s Let’s Make a Baby King, a gospel infused spiritual from the African American tradition with Children Go Where I Send Thee. Christmas Bells finds guitarist Anand Nayak setting Longfellow’s words to a new, reflective melody. The four (Arbo on fiddle, Scott Kessel on percussion, Andrew Kinsey on bass, and Nayak on guitar; they all sing) interweave voices on a song Kinsey grew up with called Julian of Norwich. Arbo’s haunting lead well suits her original music framing words by Alfred Lord Tennyson in Ring Out Wild Bells. There’s a lifting of hope in the closing song, Singing in the Land. That’s just a hint of the music, which will make a fine companion for winter’s celebrations and questions.

The title of Heidi Talbot’s newest recording, Here We Go 1,2,3 suggests change. That is an idea that pulls through the songs, the ones she writes, and the ones she chooses from contemporary writers and from traditional sources. Talbot is Irish, living now in Scotland and married to fiddle player and composer John McCusker, who worked with her to produce this project. They’ve created a musical journey that references tradition and yet is contemporary. A clear eyed facing of shifting ground and a thread of resilience to learn from whatever comes are threads that pull through as well. These are stories, too, that leave any certain conclusion open to the hearer’s reflections. Talbot’s fine soprano and thoughtful phrasing illuminate these ideas in songs including the title track, Chelsea Piers, Song for Rose (will you remember me), and The Year That I Was Born.

...and if you happen to be looking for Christmas music, Talbot worked for some years with the band Cherish the Ladies. She is the voice on their fine seasonal album called On Christmas Night on songs including Silent NIght, The Holly and the Berry (all the women trade verses on this one), and The Castle of Dromore.

For her album Songs for Christmas, Emily Smith has chosen traditional and contemporary songs along with carols that have become favorites over the years as she done festive season concerts in her home region of Dumfries and Galloway in the southwest of Scotland. This year she’s expanded her holiday tour across Scotland, sharing such favorite carols as God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen and Silent Night along with the gentle contemporary piece Santa Will Find You, the American spiritual Heard from Heaven Today and the Scots song Christ Has My Hairt Aye. Her clear voice and thoughtful phrasing imbue the songs with holiday grace and make the collection work well together. Smith’s own songwriting shines too on Find Hope and on Winter Song.

This is Cara Dillon’s first year to offer a Christmas album. Her choices for the album, which is called Upon a Winter’s Night, are in keeping with the path she’s been following in her non seasonal work, With husband and musical partner Sam Lakeman, Dillon has created a seasonal outing that shares several original songs from the couple, a piece in Irish, a reach back in time to the twelfth century for the Wexford Carol and even further back for the Advent hymn O Come, O Come Emmanuel. Dillon, who grew up in Northern Ireland, infuses the songs with a haunting grace and touches of Celtic connection along the way.

Carrie Newcomer’s recording The Beautiful Not Yet is not filled with carols -- it is not a seasonal album -- but the ideas of connection, of questions, of thoughtful reflection, and of staying in touch across time and miles work well with the holiday season. New comer has a gorgeous alto voice on which to tell the stories in this collection of original songs, too. It is an album that works well across the seasons -- as indeed all the recordings here do. During the winter holidays you might find Lean in Toward the Light, The Season Of Mercy, Sanctuary, and The Slender Thread especially worth hearing.

Bringing us back to Advent and Christmas, Matt and Shannon Heaton offer Fine Winter’s Night, which moves from contemplating how the cold dark skies of winter connect to warmth inside our homes and lives, to lively jigs and reels, both original and from Irish tradition. There’s a vignette of a Christmas love story set in Victorian era winter, and a story about a cat and Christmas, too, along with thoughtful presentations of carols including O Little Own of Bethlehem and It Came Upon the Midnight Clear. Shannon plays the flute, Matt plays the guitar, and they both sing, trading leads, joining in duets, and adding graceful harmonies as festive songs mix in with seasonal tunes.

Photograph at top by Jude Beck, other photographs by Kerry Dexter. Thank you for respecting copyright.

You may also wish to see
Music for a Winter’s Day at Wandering Educators
Scotland, Christmas, and Music at Journey to Scotland
Music for the Heart of Winter: Cathie Ryan here at Music Road
Cherish the Ladies: storytellers in song: Christmas here at Music Road

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Listening to Christmas: new winter focused albums

Winter holidays are a time for savoring the familiar and enjoying the new. That holds just a true with music as it does for travel, or flavors of Christmas cookies. Treats are in store this season, with new winter focused recordings from artists whose backgrounds range from bluegrass family band in the heartland of North America to sean nos from the Gaeltacht of Connemara in the west of Ireland. There’s a gathering of a half dozen of Scotland’s top musicians who bring their well loved Christmas concerts to record, and a recording that features the artist alone with her guitar. There’s a reunited trio of musical friends, a top Scots singer and songwriter, and one of the most well loved bands in Ireland and Irish America. All these artists have their own ideas of winter and music to share. Listen on...

Rhonda Vincent is the artist who claims bluegrass as her heritage, growing up in Missouri playing in her family’s band. She’s had success in country music too, always bringing along her strong connection to her heartland roots. That’s something she carried through in Christmas Time, her third album of holiday songs. She offers carols and secular holiday songs along with several she’s written herself. For Twelve Days of Christmas she invites in musical friends including Dolly Parton,Charlie Daniels, and Pam Tillis. Of her originals, Christmas Time at Home is the strongest, and there’s a nice medley of several familiar songs she hasn’t gotten to in full to close out the disc.

Róisín Elsafty comes from a family background in music, too, but of a different style: hers is the sean nos singing of the west of Ireland. She’s joined up with Ronan Browne on pipes and Tony Maher on piano to offer a thoughtful and interesting collection of Amhráin Na Nollag: Favourite Christmas Songs In Irish. There are melodies you’ll recognize even if Irish isn’t one of your languages, and there are several finely done instrumentals to give breadth to the sound. Singers of sean nos must learn ways to give emotion and story in song through word alone, and though Elsafty brings instruments to accompany her voice here, her mastery of that is evident, especially in some of the quieter pieces. Elsafty, Browne, and Maher have a a bit of fun with things too. In addition to thoughtful and reverent takes on such well loved songs Don Oíche Úd I Mbeithil (One Night in Bethlehem) and Oíche Chiúin (Silent Night) they also take on An Drumadóirín (The Little Drummer Boy) and then, well, there’s Rudolph Na Sróine Deirge...

Eddi Reader, Karen Matheson, Kris Drever, John McCusker, Ian Carr, and Kevin McGuire -- you could call that a dream team line up of Scotland’s musical talent, and when you consider the Christmas concerts they appear on each winter are put together by Phill Cunningham you understand why both the audiences and the artists have a really good time. Over the years and the songs, what’s known as Phil Cunningham’s Christmas Songbook has grown from a one night gig in Edinburgh to a five night run that takes in different towns and cities in Scotland. This year, it has also made it to a recording also called Phil Cunningham’s Christmas Songbook, which is filled with with generous helpings of holiday songs serious, winsome, and funny in the mix, among them The Holly and the Ivy, In the Bleak Midwinter, and Santa Will Find You.

Lindsay Straw has no backing musicians for her gig -- it’s just the woman and her guitar on her download only release The Winter EP. The Winter EP. Just a few songs, too, but they serve to show the strength and gentleness of the Boston based musician’s way with voice and instrument, and with how well she puts the two together. In her non seasonal work Straw often draws on the music of Ireland, Scotland and Appalachia, and that informs her take on It Came Upon the Midnight Clear, The Christ Child Lullaby, and the other pieces she offers.

The three women who comprise the Scotland based trio Shine decided on a winter themed EP for this season as well. Alyth McCormack, Mary MacMaster, and Corrina Hewat recorded an album together some years back but each has a full slate of musical projects in their separate careers. When they began talking about working together again, one of the things they’d like to do, they decided, was a Christmas tour in Scotland. Fire & Frost is the recording that came out of that idea. The three have terrific harmony skills, which makes whatever they choose to sing well worth hearing more than once. Hewat and MacMaster are fine harpists, as well, and they all know how to weave notes in and around the line of a song. Added to that, they’ve some things you may not have heard before, such as the Christ Child’s Lullabye with lyrics in Scots ans well as Gaelic and English.

Emily Smith usually does Christmas shows too, mostly taking a break from her international touring and keeping things close to home in her native Dumfries and Galloway in the southwest of Scotland at the holiday season. It was time, she decided, to put some of her favorite songs from those shows, songs first gathered near to home and some which caught her ear on her travels, on record. On Songs for Christmas there are carols and songs of hope and faith ranging from Silent Night to Christ Has My Hairt Ay to Smith’s own graceful meditation on the challenges and changes of winter called Winter Song.

The members of Cherish the Ladies took things home for Christmas in a way, too -- the top Irish American band, which often includes musicians from Ireland as well as Irish Americans, went to County Clare to record the band’s third Christmas album and they decided to call it Christmas in Ireland. It’s a fine collection comprising song and tune and a bit of spoken word, new material and well handed down pieces, material from Irish tradition and material created drawing from it. To the core group of Joanie Madden on flute and whistles, Kathleen Boyle on piano, Mary Coogan on guitar and Mirella Murray on accordion, top Irish musician Nollaig Casey added her talents on fiddle and Hannah Rarity from Scotland and Don Stiffe from County Galway stepped in as singers. It’s a well paced and beautifully performed collection, with every track a keeper worth repeated listening. Especially to take note of though are All the Valley Down, the O Christmas Tree set, The Christmas Letter, and Errigal Beauty.

Photographs by Kerry Dexter. Thank you for respecting copyright.

you may also wish to see
Listening to Christmas: Shannon Heaton, Cathie Ryan, Mary Black, Hanneke Cassel
Cherish the Ladies: storytellers in music
Old stories, old songs: Roisin Dubh by Elsafty, Armstrong, Browne

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Winter meditation

Winter is a time when dark comes early. We light the lamps and fires to bring light inside, and go outside to reflect on the stars in the night sky, and perhaps, the fall of snowflakes. It is a time for remembering and sharing well loved stories, and singing songs handed down across time. A time for gathering, and a time for solitude, winter is also a time for appreciating and reflecting on the roads traveled the changes made, the friendships which last, the lessons learned, the winter season is as much a time for mediation and planning and dreaming of what’s to come as well as recalling what’s past and enjoying what’s present. Whether you make resolutions at the turning of the year ot at some other time, or not at all, music is a fine companion for the reflective aspects of winter.

Music to go along with these ideas

note: clicking on text links and album cover images will take you to places where you may read more about the music and/or hear bits of it. photographs above are by Kerry Dexter and are copyrighted. thank you for respecting this.

Matt and Shannon Heaton offer Shannon’s song Fine Winter's Night which evokes the clear winter skies, cold nights, and the warmth of connection and music which also mark the season, as the tile track for their seasonal album Fine Winter's Night

It might seem touch unusual to suggest an album called Summer's End for winter meditation, but I think you’ll find Therese Honey recording of original and traditional Celtic music on the harp a good choice, as well.

Al Petteway and Amy White employ guitar dulcimer, keyboard and other instruments as they explore the Appalachian side of winter in Winter Tidings.

Gretchen Peters does a fine job of working with a song of Appalachia too, I Wonder As I Wander. It is on her album Northern Lights. which contains fine traditional and original music of the lights and shadows of winter.

Hanneke Cassel is a fiddle player and composer who has a number of albums that go well with winter reflection. The music of Scotland is her inspiration but in both interpretation and composition, her music is all her own. At this season, I’d suggest Some Melodious Sonnet

and from Carrie Newcomer, a musician whose work you’ve met before here along the music road -- a song inspired by a drive home on a winter's night

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First week in advent

Advent. Four Sundays and a midnight clear, a season of preparation, expectation, connection. A season of dreaming of Christmas to come and recalling Christmas past. A time for resolution, for forgiveness, for peace, for finding quiet and reflection amidst the world’s demands. A time for finding joy and a time for fining ways to bring the love, trust, and creativity of the season through the days and years to come.

You might like to learn about
A family tradition which helped me understand Advent when I was a small child first week in Advent: music and journey

A welcoming and thoughtful holiday tradition in Ireland, which has spread to many places across the world -- and a fine song about it too Music for the first week in Advent: candle in the window

Very fine seasonal music from one of the best groups in Irish -- any other -- music Winter music from Cherish the Ladies: storytellers in song and tune

Music to go along with these ideas, both seasonal and not
Autumn music from Childsplay
Winter Tidings: An Appalachian Christmas from Al Petteway and Amy White
Cathie Ryan: Through Wind and Rain

and a bit of holiday listening from Altan

photograph is by Kerry Dexter, and is copyrighted. thank you for respecting this

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Music, autumn, and a cup of tea

Late autumn, early winter: as the winter holidays and the turning of the year approach, it is a time of many activities, a time of bustle and a time of quiet, a time of solitude and of being with others. It is also a time of year when it’s good to take those moments, expected and unexpected, to have a bit of solitude, or perhaps a quiet loving conversation with a friend.

A good cup of tea helps, too. A musician I know says that though she has to be involved in a lot of social networking on line in her profession, a big pot of tea, a good friend, and plenty of time to talk make up all the social networking she really needs. I think she has a point.

A sunny winter morning in Massachusetts is where this cup of tea found me, as I’d arrived a bit early for one of those good conversations with a friend. Both the time for reflection and the time for conversation were blessings on that winter day. I wish both of these things for you as this holiday season begins, and continues.


Naturally, I think music goes along with this idea, too.

Harper Tasche is a musician from Washington State whose reflective recording Long Night Bright Star goes especially well with this time of year. It’s an instrumental recording, mainly harp, with music that gently yet powerfully suggests the season. If you’re in the mood for Christmas music, you’ll want to listen for Tasche’s album called Wintermas Moon, too. Click on the link in the title to hear a bit of it.

You may also wish to see
Music Road: Another Fine Winter's Night: Matt & Shannon Heaton
Music Road: winter music

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If you enjoy what you are reading here, I've recently begun publishing an occasional newsletter at Substack with more stories about music, the people who make it, and the places which inspire it. Come visit and check it out!

Song of Solstice: music for changing seasons

What is the sound of seasons changing? It could be what you hear as you listen to Song of Solstice from Jennifer Cutting’s Ocean Orchestra.

With a gathering of music from Celtic traditions along with songs she’s written, Cutting offers a vision of that which invites contemplation and celebration, consideration of darkness and light in both spiritual and natural realms that accompanies the turn of earth’s time from autumn through winter and back to spring again. To do this, she weaves in strands of musical ideas from Celtic to classical to steampunk, and creates a sound that’s immediately inviting.

Drawing on the gifts of artists from her own Ocean Orchestra as well as a range of guests, many of them from the thriving Washington DC area music scene, Cutting offers complex and layered arrangements which serve the music and open new ways of hearing it. Complex does not mean stuffy or hard to understand: there’s a very good chance you’ll be singing along with several of the pieces, and that the music will stay in your mind long after you've played the recording.

Song of Solstice, the title track, offers a rousing take on celebrating the joys of the colder seasons of the year, and gives a nod to wisdom to be gained from contemplation and patience in the calendar’s darker seasons. As well there's an affirmation of the joys of friendship, whose gifts are often strengthened by winter’s connections. Christmas Day in the Morning, a traditional tune from Shetland set as a quiet instrumental with harp from Sue Richards and bodhran from Myron Bretholz, leads into Song of Solstice, a paring which enhances both.

Green Man is another piece you’ll not forget, a lively song whose origins Cutting drew from ancient Celtic tales as well as ideas that appear in the story of King Arthur. You do not have to know anything about either of those, though, to enjoy Steve Winnick’s cheerful and inviting lead vocal. He is backed by Highland bagpipes, bouzouki, electric guitar, fiddle, bodhran, other percussion instruments, and vocal harmony. Turning of seasons, death and rebirth, and the vibrancy of nature in the midst of winter are just a few of the things touched upon in the song, which offers a fine mood and beat for dancing and drumming as well as for singing.

Time to Remember the Poor suggests a different avenue for contemplation. Gothic steam punk psychedelia fusion is what Cutting had in mind. The words are from a Victorian era broadside, set to a haunting soundscape of voice, guitar, keyboard, samples, bass, and drums, It all seems quite contemporary yet evokes the the atmosphere of Victorian times and the thoughts in the lyrics as well. Lisa Mosciatello is the voice, Al Petteway plays electric and acoustic guitars, Juan Dudley is the drummer, Rico Petrocelli plays bass, and Cutting provides the samples and plays keyboards on the piece.

Putting classic, folk -- especially Celtic -- and rock ideas in conversation and collaboration with each other is a a way of approaching music which has long interested Cutting. For ten years she was bandleader for the award winning Washington DC area based British folk rock group The New Saint George. Later, Jennifer founded The Ocean Orchestra, which has allowed her to take her composing, arranging, and performing ideas of creating music drawing on varied genres in a more Celtic direction, and to invite in the talents of changing casts of musicians in the United States and overseas. “Celtic music for ancient moderns” is how she describes her work.

“I think of myself as a soundscape architect -- I try to get the structures and textures from my imagination out onto the recorded sound canvas, with the help of many amazingly gifted people who all add their own genius into the mix, “ Cutting says. “Creating a song or an arrangement is a lot like putting up a building or designing a landscape, except that my materials are instruments and voices. Hearing it build layer by layer is the ultimate thrill.”

Listening to the result is fascinating, too. Song of Solstice includes six originals by Jennifer Cutting, and varied other works, among them pieces from Celtic tradition including music from France and from Shetland. As with a well designed building or landscape, all the elements enhance each other and invite repeated exploration.

Listen to excerpts from Song of Solstice


photograph of Jennifer Cutting by Irene Young

you may also wish to see
Music Road: Another Fine Winter's Night: Matt & Shannon Heaton
Music Road: Oceans & Journeys: Road Trip in Maryland
Music Road: late summer, early autumn, music, Ireland

If you enjoy what you’ve been reading here, a way to support more of it:

winter meditation: aine minogue

Winter: a meditation

Aine Minogue has considered the light and dark of winter in her music, and she does so as well in the dvd she has created to extend those ideas.

Minogue is a harpist from County Tipperary in Ireland, now based in the Boston area, so it perhaps comes as no surprise that she includes both ancient and modern ideas and visual elements in her work on Winter Mediation.

There are forest scenes at sunset and at sunrise. There is a burning fire which may suggest yule logs or an even older ceremony. Dancers and other figures move in and out of landscapes, half seen as they suggest stories and ideas yet to be told. Children dance; snow falls, stone spirals seem to speak. The light changes, and snow falls again, all led by Minogue’s harp through eleven tracks of music both familiar and new. Visual elements and music together make thought provoking companion as winter begins.

stills and a bit of music from the dvd




you may also want to see

Music Road: winter music

Music Road: creative practice: winter thoughts

Music Road: ceol chairlinn: sharing music in winter

Music Road: disclosure policy

music in winter, continued

One of the fine things about music is that it bridges the spaces between solitary work and creating in community. There’s nothing quite like the immediacy of music played live -- unless it might be good conversation among friends. At a good session, both go hand in hand and both are part of the connections made. That is also true of more formal stage performances, especially of the sort of music we talk about here. Music and conversation are things to remember, to enjoy, the celebrate, and to look for more opportunities to share in this winter season and beyond. Give yourself and others the gift of hearing and playing music -- and the gift of conversation, too.

The photograph which goes along with this is from a session which was part of Ceol Chairlinn in County Louth last week. Stay with us here along the music road for more about that winter music weekend, which just finished its fourth year.

to go along with these ideas

Matt & Shannon Heaton: Fine Winter's Night concert

Boston Celtic Music Festival on the way

ten songs

Celtic Connections 2009: images

Creative practice: winter light, and music

Thinking about the light, the work, and the music, of winter. A time for celebration and reflection, for community and silence, for hope and joy at the year's darkest time.

Amy Grant has a song, Breath of Heaven, in which she sees the questioning and the trust of that first Christmas winter from Mary's point of view

Carrie Newcomer has an album coming out in February called The Geography of Light. More about that here

Matt and Shannon Heaton have a holiday album which also works with these ideas. It’s called Fine Winter’s Night, and you may learn more about it here

Cathie Ryan has an album called The Farthest Wave, which speaks of grief, healing and, hope, and journeys from dark to light. Click on the title for review and comment on this album.


Narada’s Best of Celtic Christmas, Kathy Mattea’s Joy for Christmas Day, and several other holiday albums, offer music for the for the light and dark of winter. Learn more at this link.

and if you'd like to consider music for Winter, Solstice, and Holidays of all sorts follow that link for a story at Wandering Educators.

A cup of Barry's Tea and bit of your own music would be good, too.

in this season of giving, consider...

--> Music Road is reader aupported. If you are able to chip in, here is a way to do that, through PayPal. Note that you do not have to have a PayPal account to do this. Thank you.

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