Running After My Hat

Crossings

January 30, 2015 by John 2 Comments

[Image: “The Other Side,” by Gisela Giardino on Flickr. (Click image to enlarge.)
Used under a Creative Commons license.]

From whiskey river:

Happiness

A state you must dare not enter
with hopes of staying,
quicksand in the marshes, and all

the roads leading to a castle
that doesn’t exist.
But there it is, as promised,

with its perfect bridge above
the crocodiles,
and its doors forever open.

(Stephen Dunn [source])

…and:

The fierce poet of the Middle Ages wrote, “Abandon hope, all ye who enter here,” over the gates of the lower world. The emancipated poets of today have written it over the gates of this world. But if we are to understand the story which follows, we must erase that apocalyptic writing, if only for an hour. We must recreate the faith of our fathers, if only as an artistic atmosphere. If, then, you are a pessimist, in reading this story, forego for a little the pleasures of pessimism. Dream for one mad moment that the grass is green. Unlearn that sinister learning that you think is so clear, deny that deadly knowledge that you think you know. Surrender the very flower of your culture, give up the very jewel of your pride, abandon hopelessness, all ye who enter here.

(G. K. Chesterton [source])

…and:

Gone

It’s that, when I’m gone,
(and right off this is tricky)
I won’t be worried
about being gone.
I won’t be here
to miss anything.
I want now, sure,
all I’ve been gathering
since I was born,
but later
when I no longer have it,
(which might be
a state everlasting, who knows?)
this moment right now
(stand closer, love,
you can’t be too close),
is not a thing I’ll know to miss.
I doubt I’ll miss it.
I can’t get over this.

(Lia Purpura [source])

[Read more…]

Midweek Music Break: Gary Moore, “Still Got the Blues (For You)”

January 28, 2015 by John 3 Comments

[Lyrics]

Like many — maybe most — Americans with an interest in music (blues or otherwise), I know very little about the Northern Irish singer-songwriter-guitarist Gary Moore. The little I do know about him and his music, I’ve picked up after he died of a heart attack, at age 58, in 2011.

But he apparently was very well-known in Europe, especially among musicians. Wikipedia:

In a career dating back to the 1960s, Moore played with musicians including Phil Lynott and Brian Downey during his teens, leading him to memberships with the Irish bands Skid Row and Thin Lizzy, and British Band Colosseum II. Moore shared the stage with such blues and rock musicians as B.B. King, Albert King, Jack Bruce, Albert Collins, George Harrison and Greg Lake, as well as having a successful solo career. He guested on a number of albums recorded by high-profile musicians.

This single, from the 1990 album of the same name, was his best-selling release in the US, at number… [heavy thud] 83 on the Billboard 200 list. In contrast, it went gold or platinum throughout Europe (especially Sweden, where it rated a double-platinum designation).

On the way into work today, The Missus and I were talking about the knack of American Idol (and similar competitions) for unearthing outstanding musical performers — whether we’ll buy their music or not — from non-musical fields. We think about the people we’ve known who work in shops or blue-collar jobs but bring fairly sophisticated listeners to their feet, or to tears of appreciation, in karaoke bars and church choirs. It’s a little sad, in a way, to think about all the hidden talent that doesn’t make it as professional musicians (or artists, writers, and so on, for that matter).

But it’s another sort of sadness — and another level of it — to think of all those who made their way as musicians, whose music we’d love… if we’d only heard it while they were alive.

Gary Moore: now there’s a name I want to hang onto.

Enough

January 23, 2015 by John Leave a Comment

Illustration by George Herriman, for Don Marquis's 'archy and mehitabel'

[Image: illustration by George Herriman, for Don Marquis’s archy and mehitabel. And let’s change things up this week by starting with a song, because wotthehell archy wotthehell… Click Play button to begin The Only Joy In Town. While audio is playing, volume control appears at left — a row of little vertical bars. This clip is 5:13 long.]
(Lyrics here.)

[audio:theonlyjoyintown_jonimitchell.mp3|titles=’The Only Joy In Town’|artists=Joni Mitchell]

From whiskey river:

I had thought joy to be rather synonymous with happiness, but it seems now to be far less vulnerable than happiness. Joy seems to be a part of an unconditional wish to live, not holding back because life may not meet our preferences and expectations. Joy seems to be a function of the willingness to accept the whole, and to show up to meet with whatever is there. It has a kind of invincibility that attachment to any particular outcome would deny us.

(Rachel Naomi Remen [source])

…and:

working it out
(excerpt)

once in a dream I saw a snake swallowing its own
tail, it swallowed and swallowed until
it got halfway round, and there it stopped and
there it stayed, it was stuffed with its own
self. some fix, that.
we only have ourselves to go on, and it’s
enough

(Charles Bukowski [source])

[Read more…]

Midweek Music Break: The Doobie Brothers, “Black Water”

January 21, 2015 by John 9 Comments

[Image: cover of The Doobie Brothers’ 1973 album, What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits. (Click to enlarge.)]

A few days ago, as I walked through the living room, The Weather Channel was on TV. The Missus asked, “Have you seen the weather? In the Philadelphia area, I mean? Black ice.” Preoccupied, I said, “Jeez,” and shook my head, and kept on going. But the damage had been done: the phrase had set a hook in my head, where — of course! — it immediately triggered a skein of associations.

I know, I know — “black ice” simply describes the appearance of the ice, not the ice per se. I know, okay? Black ice does not come from black water.

But that’s where my mind went. And then the mental needle jumped into this song’s groove, where it has stayed.

And did I mention, this was days ago?

—

When The Doobie Brothers first started to record, I had no idea who they were. In fact, I didn’t pay much attention to them at all until ten years later, when they churned out a string of hit singles with Michael McDonald on vocals.

I did like McDonald’s distinctive voice. Plus, practically every woman I knew thought he was the bee’s knees. It had something to do with the white hair (which, sadly, never earned me any groupies of my own).

All of which said, I did know this song. McDonald wasn’t with them yet, but even allowing for the absence of his voice I’d never have guessed it to be the same band. This piece just sort of choogles loosely along, in a softer Creedence Clearwater Revival vein vs. the later “blue-eyed soul” stuff.

And the suddenly a capella refrain, repeated over and over down towards the end, sticks utterly in the head — days, years, decades later…

The album on which it appeared (pictured above) — the Doobies’ third — seems these days to be widely dismissed: not particularly interesting. But “Black Water” was the band’s first #1 hit, and I’ve never heard or read anything to suggest it shouldn’t have been.

Songwriter Patrick Simmons, says Wikipedia, was inspired by New Orleans to write the song:

A lifelong aficionado of Delta blues, Simmons would state: “When I got down there [to New Orleans] it was everything I had hoped it would be… The way of life and vibe really connected with me and the roots of my music.” Having earlier constructed the song’s basic guitar lick, he completed “Black Water” on the basis of the experience of his introduction to New Orleans: the lyrics Well if it rains, I don’t care — Don’t make no difference to me/Just take that street car that’s goin’ uptown specifically reference a streetcar journey Simmons made on a rainy day to the Garden District in Uptown New Orleans to do his laundry.

An alternate theory batted about on the theory-rich Internet asserts that the song pays tribute specifically to Mark Twain, specifically to Huckleberry Finn — sometimes adding that the novel is one of Simmons’s favorites. Romantic, hmm? And convenient. Thanks, Internet, but I’m stickin’ with the rainy-day laundry version. (See the note below for more about Simmons.)

Interestingly, “Black Water” was not at first released as a single, but as the “B” side of a song called “Another Park, Another Sunday.” According to one of the original Doobies, Tom Johnston, airplay of “Another Park” suffered because of a line which said, “Radio brings me down” — leading DJs, out of loyalty to their medium, to simply flip the record over and play the B side instead. This strikes me as (again) convenient, marginally believable 20/20 hindsight, as folklore, almost. I don’t think the song needs any external excuses for its popularity; once played, it almost demands replay. All the ingredients are right there, stuffed inside: a lyric which, while not particularly complex, fits with precision into the melody and the complex, shuffling rhythm; that a capella touch, apparently improvised in the studio; and a couple of kicking solos, especially on the violin.

[Below, click Play button to begin Black Water. While audio is playing, volume control appears at left — a row of little vertical bars. This clip is 4:15 long.]

[audio:blackwater_doobiebrothers.mp3|titles=’Black Water’|artists=Doobie Brothers]

[Lyrics]

________________________

Note: “Black Water’s” lyrics were used as a sort of pegboard wall on which those of another band’s other, later, and very different song were hung: 2009’s “I Got You,” by Train:

[Lyrics]

The Doobies’ Patrick Simmons thus received partial songwriting credit for “I Got You,” too.

[back]

Une Moment

January 16, 2015 by John Leave a Comment

[Image: “Three Boys at Lake Tanganyika” (full title: Negerknaben in der Brandung des Tahganyikasees, or “Boys in the Surf at Lake Tanganyika”) by Martin Munkácsi (ca. 1930). This picture crystallized for photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson all the elements of what became famous as his insistence that photography capture a “decisive moment.” See Cartier-Bresson’s quote about it, below.]

From whiskey river:

There are such moments in life: one unexpectedly discovers that perfection exists, that it, too, is a tiny sphere traveling in time, empty, transparent, luminous, and which sometimes (rarely) comes in our direction and encircles us for a few brief moments before traveling on to other parts and other people.

(José Saramago [source])

…and:

Horses

From the window I saw the horses.

I was in Berlin, in winter. The light
was without light, the sky without sky.

The air white like wet bread.

And from my window a vacant arena,
bitten by the teeth of winter.

Suddenly led by a man,
ten horses stepped out into the mist.

Hardly had they surged forth, like flame,
than to my eyes they filled the whole world,
empty till then. Perfect, ablaze,
they were like ten gods with pure white hoofs,
with manes like a dream of salt.

Their rumps were worlds and oranges.

Their color was honey, amber, fire.

Their necks were towers
cut from the stone of pride,
and behind their transparent eyes
energy raged, like a prisoner.

And there, in the silence, in the middle
of the day, of the dark, slovenly winter,
the intense horses were the blood
and rhythm, the animating treasure of life.

I looked. I looked and was reborn: without knowing it,
there, was the fountain, the dance of gold, the sky,
the fire that revived in beauty.

I have forgotten that dark Berlin winter.

I will not forget the light of the horses.

(Pablo Neruda [source])

…and:

But being is making; not only large things, a family, a book, a business; but the shape we give this afternoon, a conversation between friends, a meal.

(Frank Bidart [source])

[Read more…]

Not Grasping, Only Groping Towards

January 9, 2015 by John Leave a Comment

[Image: “The Amityville Handheld,” by user v1ctory_1s_m1ne on Flickr. (Used under a Creative Commons license; click to enlarge.) This seemed to me to embody the spirit of today’s theme, without explicitly stating it: it gropes in the right direction.]

From whiskey river:

What We Want

What we want
is never simple.
We move among the things
we thought we wanted:
a face, a room, an open book
and these things bear our names—
now they want us.
But what we want appears
in dreams, wearing disguises.
We fall past,
holding out our arms
and in the morning
our arms ache.
We don’t remember the dream,
but the dream remembers us.
It is there all day
as an animal is there
under the table,
as the stars are there
even in full sun.

(Linda Pastan [source])

…and:

We say to the confused, Know thyself, as if knowing yourself was not the fifth and most difficult of human arithmetical operations, we say to the apathetic, Where there’s a will, there’s a way, as if the brute realities of the world did not amuse themselves each day by turning that phrase on its head, we say to the indecisive, Begin at the beginning, as if the beginning were the clearly visible point of a loosely wound thread and all we had to do was to keep pulling until we reached the other end, and as if, between the former and the latter, we had held in our hands a smooth, continuous thread with no knots to untie, no snarls to untangle, a complete impossibility in the life of a skein, or indeed, if we may be permitted one more stock phrase, in the skein of life.

(José Saramago [source])

…and:

But if you knew you might not be able to see it again tomorrow, everything would suddenly become special and precious, wouldn’t it?

(Haruki Murakami [source])

[Read more…]

A Direction in Which to Look

January 2, 2015 by John Leave a Comment

[Video: Linda Ronstadt sings “Blue Bayou,” in a performance filmed in September, 1977.
(Lyrics here.)]

From whiskey river:

Imagine yourself streaming through time shedding gloves, umbrellas, wrenches, books, friends, homes, names. This is what the view looks like if you take a rear-facing seat on the train. Looking forward you constantly acquire moments of arrival, moments of realization, moments of discovery. The wind blows your hair back and you are greeted by what you have never seen before. The material falls away in onrushing experience. It peels off like skin from a molting snake. Of course to forget the past is to lose the sense of loss that is also memory of an absent richness and a set of clues to navigate the present by; the art is not one of forgetting but letting go. And when everything else is gone, you can be rich in loss.

(Rebecca Solnit [source])

…and (italicized portion):

New Year’s Day

The rain this morning falls
on the last of the snow

and will wash it away. I can smell
the grass again, and the torn leaves

being eased down into the mud.
The few loves I’ve been allowed

to keep are still sleeping
on the West Coast. Here in Virginia

I walk across the fields with only
a few young cows for company.

Big-boned and shy,
they are like girls I remember

from junior high, who never
spoke, who kept their heads

lowered and their arms crossed against
their new breasts. Those girls

are nearly forty now. Like me,
they must sometimes stand

at a window late at night, looking out
on a silent backyard, at one

rusting lawn chair and the sheer walls
of other people’s houses.

They must lie down some afternoons
and cry hard for whoever used

to make them happiest,
and wonder how their lives

have carried them
this far without ever once

explaining anything. I don’t know
why I’m walking out here

with my coat darkening
and my boots sinking in, coming up

with a mild sucking sound
I like to hear. I don’t care

where those girls are now.
Whatever they’ve made of it

they can have. Today I want
to resolve nothing.

I only want to walk
a little longer in the cold

blessing of the rain,
and lift my face to it.

(Kim Addonizio [source])

[Read more…]

Finding What You’re Looking For

December 26, 2014 by John Leave a Comment

[Image: “Found Anything Yet?,” by Yau Hoong Tang on Flickr. (Click to enlarge.)
Used under a Creative Commons license.]

From whiskey river:

It’s harder to talk about, but what I really, really, really want for Christmas is just this: I want to be 5 years old again for an hour. I want to laugh a lot and cry a lot. I want to be picked up or rocked to sleep in someone’s arms, and carried up to bed just one more time. I know what I really want for Christmas: I want my childhood back.

Nobody is going to give me that. I might give at least the memory of it to myself if I try. I know it doesn’t make sense, but since when is Christmas about sense, anyway? It is about a child, of long ago and far away, and it is about the child of now. In you and me. Waiting behind the door of our hearts for something wonderful to happen. A child who is impractical, unrealistic, simpleminded and terribly vulnerable to joy.

It’s just this: that there are places we all come from — deep-rooty-common places — that makes us who we are. And we disdain them or treat them lightly at our peril. We turn our backs on them at the risk of self-contempt. There is a sense in which we need to go home again — and can go home again. Not to recover home, no. But to sanctify memory.

(Robert Fulghum [source, among others])

…and:

You have no idea how hard I’ve looked
for a gift to bring You.
Nothing seemed right.
What’s the point of bringing gold
to the gold mine, or water to the ocean.
Everything I came up with was like
taking spices to the Orient.
It’s no good giving my heart and my
soul because you already have these.
So I’ve brought you a mirror.
Look at yourself and remember me.

(Jalal al-Din Rumi [widely quoted around the Web, in these or other words, e.g., from this source])

[Read more…]

Midweek Music Break: “Jingle Bells?,” by Barbra Streisand

December 24, 2014 by John Leave a Comment

For some reason, this rendition of the classic song — from La Streisand’s 1967 Christmas album — has ended up on a number of “worst [or least favorite] Christmas songs” lists (e.g.). Maybe just because it’s a family favorite, though, I’ve never minded it at all. True, it’s not a song I’d want to hear over and over; few songs are. But a few times? No problem.

If you’re not familiar with it, the question mark in the title is mandatory. While it’s the same old song, melodically and lyrically, it actually resembles the same old song only in the way that, oh… in the way that Raymond Babbitt (Dustin Hoffman’s Rain Man role) resembles an endearing old vicar tallying up the weekly church offerings. For this reason, unlike probably 90% of the covers I’ve encountered, it doesn’t have James Lord Pierpont or “Traditional” alone credited as its author. To his name are added two new ones, those of producer Jack Gold and arranger Marty Paich.

Pierpont’s probably not exactly rolling over in his grave, although he may be scratching his head.

For what it’s worth, I’ve belatedly added Streisand’s recording to this year’s ~~Quirky~~ Eclectic Christmas Mix, at position #68 overall (#8 for the year). This actually seems to have been a mistake: a couple days ago, I “realized” that I’d repeated one song from an earlier year — and inserted “Jingle Bells?” as its replacement. As it turns out, the mistake was not in this year’s Christmas mix, but in my burning of the earlier year’s CD, for offline listening. Ha!

[Below, click Play button to begin Jingle Bells?. While audio is playing, volume control appears at left — a row of little vertical bars. This clip is 1:52 long.]

[audio:68_jinglebells_barbrastreisand.mp3|titles=’Jingle Bells?’|artists=Barbra Streisand]

A Quirky Eclectic Christmas Mix (2014 ed.)

December 19, 2014 by John Leave a Comment

[Video: note the bass with a truncated bottom. It’s called a Czech-Ease road bass, sold (and apparently designed) by one David Gage of New York. As for the performance, lauded by Penn Jillette as “a tiny little bit of perfect,” it really channels Patsy Cline, doesn’t it? (At the outset, you may wonder — as did I — where the plural “duelling bassES” comes from. Give it time — almost a minute.) For more information on Kate Davis, drop by her Web site. Elvis’s original version of the song is number 22 in the below list, from 2010.]

So: another year, another Christmas… Here (as I’ve done annually since 2008), I’ve added ten songs to the bottom of the previous years’ entries. As before, these artists and songs appear, back-to-back, in the following playlist:

Want to visit the pages for earlier playlists, which include videos, other songs, and some background material not in the “official” list? Here y’go:

— 2008: —

Peter Robbins et al.: dialogue from A Charlie Brown Christmas
Anonymous 4: Hodie Christus Natus Est
Waverly Consort: Three Spanish Villancicos – Dadme Albcrecias
Perry Como: Home for the Holidays
Mannheim Steamroller: Joy to the World
George Winston: The Holly and the Ivy
Celtic Woman: O Holy Night
John Denver and the Muppets: The Twelve Days of Christmas
Al Hirt: Nutty Jingle Bells
The Roches: Deck the Halls
— 2009: —
Charlotte Church: Mary’s Boy Child
Madeleine Peyroux/k.d. lang: River
George Winston: Variations on the Kanon
Arthur Fiedler & The Boston Pops: The Toy Trumpet
Eartha Kitt: Santa Baby
Mannheim Steamroller: Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer
Celtic Woman: The Wexford Carol
The Brian Setzer Orchestra: Jingle Bells
Jimmy Boyd: I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus
Cumberland Gap Reunion: Silent Night
— 2010: —
Sam Phillips: Cold Dark Night (lyrics)
Elvis Presley: Blue Christmas
Loreena McKennitt: God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen (may be my favorite addition to this year’s list…)
The Chipmunks: The Chipmunk Song
Frank Sinatra: Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
London Philharmonic Orchestra: It Came Upon a Midnight Clear
Tony Elman: Winter Creek
Sara Groves: Toy Packaging (lyrics) (…and this may be my favorite for grins)
Harry Belafonte: Mary’s Boy Child
Ray Conniff Singers: Ring Christmas Bells
— 2011: —
Ralph Marterie and His Band: Dig That Crazy Santa Claus
Nat King Cole: The Christmas Song
The Indigo Girls: It Really Is (A Wonderful Life) (lyrics)
Johnny Mercer and the Pied Pipers: Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town
Dean Martin: Baby It’s Cold Outside (also see the wonderful American Songwriter writeup on the story of this song’s composition [thanks, Jules!])
Ferrante and Teicher: Sleigh Ride
Bo Dollis & Wild Magnolias: Shakana Santa Shake It
Neil Diamond: Silver Bells
Taverner Consort, Choir, & Players (Andrew Parrott, conductor): Branle de l’Officiel (Ding! Dong! Merrily on High)
George Winston: Carol of the Bells
— 2012: —
Michael Tilson-Thomas & Philharmonia Orchestra: The Nutcracker (Overture)
Vince Guaraldi Trio: O Tannenbaum
Troy Hess: Christmas on the Moon (And don’t worry, it’s not just you: no one else seems to understand the lyrics (other than the refrain), either.* America’s Singing Souvenir Troy Hess was four years old when he recorded this in 1970. )
Barbra Streisand: I Wonder as I Wander
Frank Sinatra: Jingle Bells
Al Hirt: Ave Maria
Art Neville: Christmas Gumbo
Ella Fitzgerald: Frosty the Snowman
Dean Martin: I’ll Be Home for Christmas
Choir of King’s College, Cambridge: Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht
— 2013: —
Knightsong: Christmas Is Coming
Mannheim Steamroller: Pat-a-Pan
Vienna Boys’ Choir: The Little Drummer Boy
Tori Amos: Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
Cumberland Gap Reunion: The First Noel
I Soloisti di Zagreb & Antonio Janigro: Toy Symphony: I: Allegro
Liuba María Hevia (Spanish-language site): Venid Fieles Todos (Adeste Fidelis) (probably my favorite track in this year’s mix)
Corporal Blossom: White Christmas
Perry Como: O Holy Night
Enya: Oíche Chiúin [Chorale] — 2014: —
George Winston: Some Children See Him
She & Him: Baby It’s Cold Outside (this year’s favorite!)
Bing Crosby: Winter Wonderland
Barry Gordon: Nuttin’ for Christmas
Mahalia Jackson: Go Tell It on the Mountain
Bobby Helms: Jingle Bell Rock
Ray Conniff & the Ray Conniff Singers: The Twelve Days of Christmas
Barbra Streisand: Jingle Bells? (And yes, the question mark belongs there! You might be interested in the Midweek Music Break for this song, posted on December 24, 2014 — which explains why this number replaced the one I first included here.)
Emmylou Harris: Light of the Stable
Boston Pops Orchestra: The Nutcracker: Final Waltz

(Note: The playlist goes automatically from start to finish, once you click the little Play button. To fast-forward to the next number, once a song is playing you’ll find a little fast-forward button to the right of its progress meter. And a fast-rewind to the left, for that matter.)

[audio:00_dialoguefromacharliebrownchristmas.mp3, 01_hodiechristusnatusest_anonymous4.mp3, 02_threespanishvillancicos_dadme_albricias_waverlyconsort.mp3, 03_homefortheholidays_perrycomo.mp3, 04_joytotheworld_mannheimsteamroller.mp3, 05_thehollyandtheivy_georgewinston.mp3, 06_oholynight_celticwoman.mp3, 07_12daysofchristmas_denvermuppets.mp3, 08_nuttyjinglebells_alhirt.mp3, 09_deckthehalls_theroches.mp3, 11_marysboychild_charlottechurch.mp3, 12_river_peyrouxlang.mp3, 13_variationsonthekanonbypachelbel_georgewinston.mp3, 14_thetoytrumpet_fiedler.mp3, 15_santababy_earthakitt.mp3,
16_rudolphtherednosedreindeer_mannheimsteamroller.mp3, 17_thewexfordcarol_celticwoman.mp3, 18_jinglebells_briansetzerorchestra.mp3, 19_isawmommykissingsantaclaus_jimmyboyd.mp3, 20_silentnight_cumberlandgapreunion.mp3, 21_colddarknight_samphillips.mp3, 22_bluechristmas_elvispresley.mp3, 23_godrestyemerrygentlemen_loreenamckennitt.mp3, 24_thechipmunksong_thechipmunks.mp3, 25_haveyourselfamerrylittlechristmas_franksinatra.mp3, 26_itcameuponamidnightclear_londonphilharmonicorchestra.mp3, 27_wintercreek_tonyelman.mp3, 28_toypackaging_saragroves.mp3, 29_marysboychild_harrybelafonte.mp3, 30_ringchristmasbells_rayconniffsingers.mp3, 31_digthatcrazysantaclaus_ralphmarterie.mp3, 32_thechristmassong_natkingcole.mp3, 33_itreallyis_indigogirls.mp3, 34_santaclausiscomintotown_johnnymercer.mp3, 35_babyitscoldoutside_deanmartin.mp3, 36_sleighride_ferranteandteicher.mp3, 37_shakanasantashakeit_bodolliswildmagnolias.mp3, 38_silverbells_neildiamond.mp3, 39_branledelofficiel_tavernerconsort.mp3, 40_carolofthebells_georgewinston.mp3, 41_nutcrackeroverture_tilsonthomas_philharmonia.mp3, 42_otannenbaum_vinceguaralditrio.mp3, 43_christmasonthemoon_troyhess.mp3, 44_iwonderasiwander_barbrastreisand.mp3, 45_jinglebells_franksinatra.mp3, 46_avemaria_alhirt.mp3, 47_christmasgumbo_artneville.mp3, 48_frostythesnowman_ellafitzgerald.mp3, 49_illbehomeforchristmas_deanmartin.mp3, 50_stillenachtheiligenacht_choirofkingscollege.mp3, 51_christmasiscoming_knightsong.mp3, 52_patapan_mannheimsteamroller.mp3, 53_thelittledrummerboy_viennaboyschoir.mp3, 54_haveyourselfamerrylittlechristmas_toriamos.mp3, 55_thefirstnoel_cumberlandgapreunion.mp3, 56_toysymphonyiallegro_isoloistidizagrebantoniojanigro.mp3, 57_venidfielestodos_liubamariahevia.mp3, 58_whitechristmas_corporalblossom.mp3, 59_oholynight_perrycomo.mp3, 60_oichechiuin_enya.mp3, 61_somechildrenseehim_georgewinston.mp3, 62_babyitscoldoutside_sheandhim.mp3, 63_winterwonderland_bingcrosby.mp3, 64_nuttinforchristmas_barrygordon.mp3, 65_gotellitonthemountain_mahaliajackson.mp3, 66_jinglebellrock_bobbyhelms.mp3, 67_thetwelvedaysofchristmas_rayconniff.mp3, 68_jinglebells_barbrastreisand.mp3, 69_lightofthestable_emmylouharris.mp3, 70_thenutcrackerfinalwaltz_bostonpops.mp3|titles=’A Quirky/Eclectic Christmas Music Playlist’|artists=Various Artists]

If you’re pressed for time, and/or just don’t want to (re-)listen to the earlier years’ selections, with the player gizmo below you can listen to just 2014’s ten-song list, without having to fast-forward to it through earlier lists. And as in the last couple of years, I’ve also given RAMH regulars (and anyone else who can figure it out!) the chance to use their secret right-bracket decoder rings, to listen to the playlist later without even visiting here. Here we go with the ten selections from this year only:

[2014 only]

[audio:61_somechildrenseehim_georgewinston.mp3, 62_babyitscoldoutside_sheandhim.mp3, 63_winterwonderland_bingcrosby.mp3, 64_nuttinforchristmas_barrygordon.mp3, 65_gotellitonthemountain_mahaliajackson.mp3, 66_jinglebellrock_bobbyhelms.mp3, 67_thetwelvedaysofchristmas_rayconniff.mp3, 68_jinglebells_barbrastreisand.mp3, 69_lightofthestable_emmylouharris.mp3, 70_thenutcrackerfinalwaltz_bostonpops.mp3|titles=’A Quirky/Eclectic Christmas Music Playlist’ (2014 ed.)|artists=Various Artists]

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