The Orlando Consort: Medieval Christmas
Harmonia Mundi 907418
Format: CD

Musical Performance
Sound Quality
Overall Enjoyment

Over the past 20 years, a growing number of holiday discs have been devoted to medieval music. This one is a bit different. Performed by unaccompanied male voices -- a countertenor, two tenors, baritone, and bass -- it is divided into five categories: Prophecy, New Year’s Day, The Carol, Narrative Motets, and Noël. The program begins with the very simple "Christe redemptor," an example of a type of chant called an organum, and ends with Antoine Brumel’s complex "Nato canunt omnia," a five-part motet based on eight plainchant melodies. If all that is too complex for you, just put the CD in your player, turn the lights down low, and enjoy the Orlando Consort’s impeccable singing and the resulting spiritual ambience. The sound -- close-up, warm, and with quite a bit of reverberation -- is entirely appropriate to the program….Rad Bennett

Brad Paisley: Christmas
Arista 00533
Format: CD

Musical Performance
Sound Quality
Overall Enjoyment

Brad Paisley released one of this year’s best country CDs, Time Well Wasted. Its lyrics tackled 20th-century living with sharp insight and humor, and it won the Country Music Association’s prestigious Best Album of the Year award. This new Christmas disc is a bit more traditional, but Paisley himself wrote its best songs. "Penguin, James Penguin" is Santa’s "Secret Agent Bird," who ferrets out kids naughty and nice. With its memorable verse, it’s sort of a "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" for 2006. Paisley wrote "Born on Christmas Day" when he was 12; the track begins with a recording he made of it the following year, then switches to adult Brad, then combines them as a duo. The album ends with the Kung Pau Buckaroos -- George Jones, Bill Anderson, and "Little" Jimmy Dickens -- joining Paisley in some hilarious comments about Christmas as a politically correct holiday. The CD’s sound is typical "made for FM radio": centered in front, thick and mushy, with little transparency or stereo spread. Will Nashville ever learn that many lovers of country music have good sound systems?...Rad Bennett

Furnace Mountain: Fly the River
Shepherds Ford 200609
Format: CD

Musical Performance
Sound Quality
Overall Enjoyment

Virginia trio Furnace Mountain has released yet another A+ album. If you haven’t yet heard this Appalachian string band, consider this your cue -- give one listen to this or any of their prior discs and hear music that sings to the soul. Drawing inspiration from Celtic, folk, and old-timey roots, the group is sure to enamor all who encounter them, and the unmatched vocal pairing of bassist Aimee Curl and bouzouki player Morgan Morrison is nothing short of spine-tingling. Trading leads and weaving harmonies, the two women captivate the ear in ways that are enchanting, mesmerizing, and downright divine. Fiddlin’ Dave VanDeventer, as he is known, infuses the band with lively spirit, expertly guiding such purely instrumental tunes as "Duck River" and "Chinquapin Hunting." The trio is often enhanced by the addition of a bodhran (a drum of Irish origin) and the occasional inclusion of mandolin and washtub. Nearly all of the songs are traditional, but each one, from the very obscure to the somewhat familiar, has been reworked and re-envisioned as something fresh and original. If you like live music, check out Furnace Mountain each September in Berryville, Virginia, when they host the legendary Watermelon Park Festival. For more information about the band, this album, and Watermelon Park, visit www.furnacemountain.com....Shannon Holliday

Maria Muldaur: Sings Love Songs of Bob Dylan: Heart of Mine
Telarc CD-83643
Format: CD

Musical Performance
Sound Quality
Overall Enjoyment

When a diva meets an icon, one can usually expect sparks to fly. When blues, pop, and jazz singer extraordinaire Maria Muldaur finally decided to record some of the love songs of Bob Dylan, her pal and music icon par excellence, those sparks quickly became a full-fledged forest fire. Muldaur and Dylan grew up together in Greenwich Village in the early 1960s and know each other’s music intimately. Hearing Muldaur’s distinctive voice caress such songs as "Lay Baby Lay (Lay Lady Lay)," "I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight," "You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go," and "You Ain’t Going Nowhere" as she filters them through her bluesiana style, is one of life’s true musical treats. While Muldaur didn’t write these songs, one listen will convince you that she’s personally lived every one of them. Telarc again lives up to its own exacting sonic standards: Muldaur’s voice is a distinct 3D presence, and instrumental tone is well handled, as is the sense of space….John Crossett

Lynne Arriale Trio: Live
Lynne Arriale, piano; Jay Anderson, bass; Steve Davis, drums.
In+Out MTM-00007
Format: CD, DVD

Musical Performance
Sound Quality
Picture Quality
Overall Enjoyment

Jazz pianist Lynn Arriale eases into "Iko Iko," the opening track on Live, but her trio soon has it simmering over a low flame as they get to the bluesy center of James "Sugar Boy" Crawford’s New Orleans classic. Arriale has appeared on NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday and was profiled on the PBS series Portrait of a Performing Artist. That documentary is included on the DVD of this two-disc set, along with a filmed version of the performance contained on the CD. The sound on both discs is clean and bright but lacks warmth, and bassist Jay Anderson is mixed too low. But Arriale’s emotion-filled playing shines through, especially on the ballads, such as her own "Arise." This trio has played together since 1993, and it shows -- Anderson and drummer Steve Davis give Arriale great intuitive support. The pianist’s approach to the Beatles’ "Come Together" is too conservative, but the remaining tracks on Live are by turns swinging and moving….Joseph Taylor