A Midwinter Night's Dream
Product Details | Similar Products | Customer Reviews | Artist: Loreena McKennitt List Price: £13.99 Our Price: £9.99 You Save: £4.00 (29%) Availability: Usually dispatched within 1 to 3 weeks  |
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 | Product Details: Release Date: 09 November 2009 Record Label: Quinlan Road Rating:  Sales Rank: 22312 | | Look for similar items by category:
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| | Customer Reviews: I love this CD ! (22 December 2009)After reading the previous reviews before ordering I decided to go ahead and give this a try...I was looking for something 'different' for Christmas. It is beautiful; a stunning collection of music, both haunting, moving and relaxing. A folky/celtic feel to most of the pieces, give an historical feel and the vocals are spectacular. If she'd never existed Loreena McKennit would have to have been invented (11 December 2009)I have a pretty complete collection of Loreena McKennit including stuff from her London company Quinlan Road.The first one I bought was the Winter Garden 5 tracker. Without having had a sizeable hit on the pop charts Loreena McKennit is not known to the masses but you have to be careful listening to her music-you could get addicted Loreena McKennitt does it again (28 August 2009)Another ethereal composition of work by this most talented of female singers/composers/musicians. For me, Loreena McKennitt can do no wrong. I have been a fan of hers now for almost a decade. I first heard her whilst in Glastonbury and she has remained a favourite ever since. This album contains one or two old favourites but they have been re-done. I am always entranced to hear her interpretation of Archiblad Lampman's 'Snow'... one cannot help but feel that this late Victorian poet somehow knew M/s McKennitt would come along in the future and set this to music. For those of you yet unititated, her voice has a haunting quality, she is a multitalented instrumentalist as well as singer/composer and plays the harp as well as irish/african/indian drums and of course her piano. Do take the time to search her music on You-tube and then return to Amazon to buy! Tracks to hear include 'The Highwayman' (Edwardian poet 'Alfred Noyes' - your kids will be doing this at primary school), Dante's Prayer, The Wild Swans and Skellig... these are all personal favourites. Enjoy.  God rest ye merry (16 January 2009)Consider Loreena McKennitt's latest album to be a natural expansion of her exquisite Yuletide EP, "A Winter Garden." In fact, McKennitt includes four of those five songs on the sumptuously melancholy Christmas album "A Midwinter Night's Dream." These medieval ballads and traditional carols are soaked in an ambience of nighttime woods, embroidered tapestries, wassail and Christmas mass in a shadowy cathedral. No syrupy shopping carols -- this is Christmas music from an earlier age. It opens with a swell of piano and quivering strings, as McKennitt murmurs, "The holly and the ivy/when they are full grown/of all the trees in the wood/the holly bears the crown... the rising of the sun/the running of the deer/the playing of the organ/sweet singing in the choir...." It's a suitable introduction to the album -- quiet, soft, and redolent with medieval Christianity alongside the forest's powerful vibrancy. And it quickly segues into the stately fiddle-riddled dance of "Un Flambeau Jeannette Isabelle," the languid hymn "The Seven Rejoices Of Mary" and the swaying "Noël Nouvelet!" Then she heads into more familiar traditional fare -- the sprightly "Good King Wenceslas," the gentle lullably "Coventry Carol" with its tale of King Herod's baby massacre, and staccato rhythms of "God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen." After that it's a mixture of well-known and more obscure -- a pair mellow haunting instrumentals, a bittersweet ballad a trembling string rendition of the traditional "Emmanuel," and even a hearty wassailing song. Along with Sufjan Stevens' Christmas EPs, "A Midwinter Night's Dream" is one of the few Christmas albums that breaks the mold -- no "Jingle Bells," no "Let It Snow," no sentimental carols performed exactly the same as hundreds of other renditions. In other words, no painfully commercial carols meant for radioplay. Instead, McKennitt seems content to transport listeners back to tapestry-draped castles, dark nights filled with laughter and food, snowy forests and candelit stone churches. Her songs are crammed with stately sweet violins, plucked lute and some rhythmic little hand drums, as well as a sinuous flute that gives it a slightly Middle-Eastern flavor in "God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen." The crowning touch is McKennitt's strong, sweetly rich voice, which always sounds like she's restraining herself from REALLY blowing you away. Her voice slips easily into all the traditional carols, with their subjects ranging a saintly king's mission of mercy to Christina Rossetti's haunting poem of adoring the Christ child ("Cherubim and seraphim/Thronged the air/But his mother only/In her maiden bliss/Worshipped the Beloved/With a kiss..."). "A Midwinter Night's Dream" is a haunting, richly realized Christmas album with a melancholy edge and truly exquisite traditional carols. A must-listen in any Christmas season. Top Class (14 December 2008)Loreena always produces top class material and her arrangements are beautifully executed. Nothing really new here-but it is still all immaculate. You can't give any less than 5 stars! |
