This Christmas season I am covering A Christmas Carol from the Skylark Vocal Ensemble under the direction of Michael Guard with music from Benedict Sheehan.
Say again...?
That earlier recording came out in 2022, on Blu-ray nonetheless. This one is from 2025, and I believe will only be available for streaming, although stay tuned as I update this blog post.
It is extremely rare in Classical Music to see the exact same program, with the exact same performers, putting out essentially the exact same recording within a few years of each other. I would be hard put to name such an occasion, although when Christmas is involved, perhaps there are more examples.
What is the difference? Well, if you didn't see it on the cover, Christine Baranski is narrating. Earlier, Sarah Walker narrated, an Appalachian storyteller where I had my doubts regarding her abilities in a British tale. Baranski is a Hollywood figure, also hailing from the US, however her huskier vocal quality and pitch seems better geared towards a ghost story.
Otherwise, we have Christmas carol arrangements from Benedict Sheehan, an adapted Dickens narration, and plenty of choral singing. I do believe the Skylark Vocal Ensemble tours this program every year, so they are well lived in this production. For more information on the whole work, check out my earlier blog post in the fuchsia link above.
I will update with more detail as I spend more time with this recording, but I wanted to post my initial remarks at seeing this recording appear in the past weeks. If you haven't heard the Skylark Vocal Ensemble's unique approach to music programming, these are well worth a listen.
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