On the Twelfth Day of Christmas

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It’s the twelfth day of Christmas, it’s time for a wassail! Wassailing is an old English tradition dating back to the middle ages. In rural areas, it involved going out on twelfth night and blessing the fruit trees by drinking and singing to their good health, in the hope of a good harvest. Another variant of the tradition involved going from house to house singing wassails, to bring good wishes to neighbours (from Old English ‘was hál’ meaning ‘be hale’). These customs have been kept up or revived, in various parts of England. So, to wish you good health in the coming year, I bring you Here We Come a Wassailing sung here by Kate Rusby, from her album ‘Sweet Bells’.

To find out more about wassailing and whereabouts in England it’s all happening, have a look at this article by Jon Wilks (which contains details and locations of wassails) on tradfolk. To read about the history of wassailing (and the wassail bowl) look at this on the National Trust website.

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On the Eleventh Day of Christmas

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I don’t think could ever tire of hearing Vivaldi’s popular work ‘The Four Seasons’ written about 1718 – 1720, but if I did, I could listen instead to Max Richter’s re-imagining of the work. Richter took parts of Vivaldi’s original and recomposed the piece with the same format: four violin concertos, each with three movements. Here’s the first movement from Winter, appropriate for those of us in the northern hemisphere. I enjoy the uneven pulse which gives a surprising new energy to the piece.

If like me, this makes you want to go back and listen to the original, here’s one of the many exciting performances I have watched recently on You Tube. This is London Musical Arts Ensemble with Vivaldi’s Winter (all three movements) recorded in 2013, at the Church of St Martin in the Fields, London.

Tomorrow will be the last in my ‘Twelve days of Christmas’ mini series! If you have enjoyed any of my posts please share using the social media buttons. You can also subscribe to my blog by scrolling down and adding your email address. Thank you.

On the Tenth Day of Christmas

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I have just a few more musical gifts to share with you before twelfth night! If you’ve not heard this before, I hope you enjoy the surprise. Bulgarian polyphonic singing has a distinctive sound, coming from a vocal technique that creates a strident tone and harmonies that are full of exciting dissonances. Perunika Trio is a London-based group who specialise in this style of singing. I especially love the whoops and shrieks in this track. Oops, did I just give away the surprise?