Our Review
I always try to pick the coolest, most mellow sound to start with of a Saturday morning, the time slot I've sort of fallen into to catch up with a week's worth of listening. And did I ever pick right this time. While I am in the middle bedroom, lying in my grandmother's bed with the blue glow of a silenced MSNBC and my wife still asleep elsewhere, I am hearing the most pleasant and unassuming sound of The Robert Way Orchestra and Chorus on A Quiet Christmas With You, one of two.
I assumed A Quiet Christmas With You is electronic because there are no credits in the liner notes. Whenever there are no credits listed, I assume electronic. It used to be I would always assume people just forgot to put together useful liner notes, but in this case it was not about forgetting. There were evidently some licensing reasons for not listing all of the musical credits, but I have it on good authority that the musicians include members of the Polish Radio Symphony.
These selections would be classified as easy listening and dismissed my much of my generation as "elevator music". But in the elevators where I work, there is no music, only quiet despair. And since I prefer elevator music to quiet despair, I am imagining what this CD would be like if we were to use it in the elevators where I work, because I want to be done with quiet despair and replace it with A Quiet Christmas With You
Mr. Way has produced an ample set here of the cool stuff here, at 56 minutes and with 20 more or less traditional selections taken from both secular and sacred collections. Way's orchestration tends to homogenize, lending cheery favorites, such as Up On The Housetop a pensive air, while, paradoxically, modulating the tension in Silent Night to a manageable level. As I said, a perfect early morning wake up mix, coffee with a little bit of cream to take the edge off.
So, don't despair. Start off your silent Saturday morning--or embark on that quiet elevator ride--with a bit of Robert Way's A Quiet Christmas With You. You will be pleased with the result.
--Richard Banks
(Reviewed in 2007)
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From the liner notes:
Arrangements and Orchestrations by Robert R. Way, BMI
The Robert Way Orchestra and Chorus
A Quiet Christmas With You
Artist site
Label: Reynall Music Publishers
Length: 56 minutes
Genre: Easy Listening
Release: 2003
Track List
| Song Title |
|---|
| Christmas With You |
| Sweet Was The Song The Virgin Sang |
| Lullay , Thou Little Child |
| Love Came Down At Christmas |
| The First Good Joy |
| Christmas Is Glowing |
| A Virgin Most Pure |
| A Little Child On Earth Was Born |
| Silent Night |
| Up On The Housetop |
| The Holly And The Ivy |
| The Babe In Bethlehem's Manger Laid |
| God Touched The Earth |
| Christ Was Born In Bethlehem |
| Away In A Manger |
| Beside The Cradle Here I Stand |
| We Three Kings Of Orient Are |
| Little Women |
| Here We Come A-Wassailing |
| Everything Says Christmas Is Here |