Advent: a song for reflection and a song for dancing

Advent.

It is a season of preparation, reflection, looking forward to Christmas and back at the year drawing to a close.

Perhaps Christmas and Advent are not of your faith or on your calendar of seasons.

Still it is a time of that invites reflection, that holds both solitude and connection.

Music is good companion to those different aspects of the season.

With that in mind, as Advent begins, a song for reflecting and a song for dancing, too.

The first day of Advent this year is also Saint Andrew;s Day. Saint Andrew is the patron saint of Scotland, so it seems only right to begin with a song from one of Scotland’s top musicians.

Emily Smith comes from Dumfries and Galloway in the southwest of Scotland. A few years back, she found herself snowed in at her home.

During that time she wrote Winter Song, which considers the quiet of that deep snow covered landscape and the passage of winter days and nights into the New Year.

Celebrating and being with others is a part fo the preparation and celebration of Advent too.

That’s something Suzy Bogguss and her husband Doug Crider took inot full account when they were writing the song Two Step Round the Christmas Tree. Whether or not Christmas is your holiday or not, whether there’s a Christmas tree about or not, if you know how to dance the two step well or never heard of it, you will be drawn into the lively spirit of the song. Likely you will find yourself joining in on the singing of it, and perhaps dancing as well.

Quiet reflection, lively dance steps: both are good ways to begin and to refresh spirits as Advent begins.

Thank you for being here.

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Also...

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You might also like to see
Another song of the season, about preparation, and a cat
Music for Starry Winter Nights, at Wandering Educators
About One More Christmas, from Christine Albert and Chris Gage. RIP this Chritmas, Chris.