Digital Editor’s Note: I’m excited and proud to welcome Rob Allwright as a Guest Writer here at the Sorted Magazine website. Rob brings a wealth of experience and is one of the most respected Christian reviewers in the UK. The energy Rob devotes to supporting and encouraging Christian creatives is staggering. His review show One Man In The Middle is broadcast by Branch FM, Heartsong Live and Hope FM. And I’m just a teensy bit excited that he has joined the wonderful peeps at the Manchester based broadcaster Konnect Radio!
Rob writes: For those who love their Christmas music with a touch of class then you need look no further than this classic album from All Souls Orchestra in London. Marked as Prom Praise Celebrates Christmas this album takes you on a classical journey through instrumentals of some of the best loved Christmas Carols and songs. Arranged and conducted by Dr Noel Tredinnick this album captures a great crisp orchestral sound which will bring a warm glow to any room where it is played!
The first track A Christmas Festival is a bit of a medley of many different Christmas songs brilliantly wrapped up together in one brilliant piece of music and you can’t help but be swept into the Christmas spirit with this. While this is one piece of music it brilliantly captures the different elements of the various songs included here, there is time to dwell in a couple of parts before you are swept along to something else. This first track is just under seven minutes long and it really flies past! The second track also takes pieces from some of the more majestic sounding Christmas hymns. In The Bleak Midwinter, O Come All Ye Faithful, God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen and others are blended together to become A Christmas Overture.
The next track is Silent Night which, when it comes to Carols is many people’s favourite. They have certainly done it justice with this version as there is a little prelude before the Cello’s come in with the main harmony and slowly other areas of the orchestra work their way into the familiar tune. It was intended that these versions of the songs would be an excellent backdrop for the Christmas season, but additionally they should be music that could be sung to as well if that is something you wanted to do. With these tracks that are well known they have kept the arrangements relatively straight forward, with a bit of an intricate introduction and then into the main body of the music. There are some rather grand openings, such as the amazing organ opening up It Came Upon A Midnight Clear.
Along with the classics and the medleys there are some less well known tracks, including From The Squalor Of A Borrowed Stable by Stuart Townend which has never really broken out of the church in the way that it should have done, because it is a truly beautiful song. A track that I am not terribly familiar with is Overture: Hansel and Gretel originally composed by Engelbert Humperdinck which is included on this album and shows that this orchestra aren’t afraid to take on something a little more rare and challenging. The last medley on the album is the A Festival of Carols which combines another whole load of well known tunes starting with Hark, The Herald Angels Sing these even re-cover some ground with different interpretations of some carols that have appeared previously.
This may not be the most high-brow of orchestra’s but I think that they have done a great job with these arrangements to bring these carols to life as instrumentals. These could easily play in the background throughout the whole of the Christmas period, through dinner parties, family gatherings and more, additionally they could be used for a little bit of Carol worship too for small groups or personal worship. I’m not a big orchestral or classical music fan but I really enjoyed these and appreciate the talent from every member of the orchestra.
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Sorted discusses the big issues of the day – focusing on subjects as diverse as culture, sport, cars, health, faith, gadgets, humour and relationships. We aim to be positive and wholesome in all we do. And we have been achieving this since 2007.
Every printed issue of Sorted is read by more than 100,000 men in 21 different countries – while digitally, the number of people reading our online content (free and via subscription) continues to soar.
Music: A Festival of Christmas by All Souls Orchestra
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Digital Editor’s Note: I’m excited and proud to welcome Rob Allwright as a Guest Writer here at the Sorted Magazine website. Rob brings a wealth of experience and is one of the most respected Christian reviewers in the UK. The energy Rob devotes to supporting and encouraging Christian creatives is staggering. His review show One Man In The Middle is broadcast by Branch FM, Heartsong Live and Hope FM. And I’m just a teensy bit excited that he has joined the wonderful peeps at the Manchester based broadcaster Konnect Radio!
Rob writes: For those who love their Christmas music with a touch of class then you need look no further than this classic album from All Souls Orchestra in London. Marked as Prom Praise Celebrates Christmas this album takes you on a classical journey through instrumentals of some of the best loved Christmas Carols and songs. Arranged and conducted by Dr Noel Tredinnick this album captures a great crisp orchestral sound which will bring a warm glow to any room where it is played!
The first track A Christmas Festival is a bit of a medley of many different Christmas songs brilliantly wrapped up together in one brilliant piece of music and you can’t help but be swept into the Christmas spirit with this. While this is one piece of music it brilliantly captures the different elements of the various songs included here, there is time to dwell in a couple of parts before you are swept along to something else. This first track is just under seven minutes long and it really flies past! The second track also takes pieces from some of the more majestic sounding Christmas hymns. In The Bleak Midwinter, O Come All Ye Faithful, God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen and others are blended together to become A Christmas Overture.
The next track is Silent Night which, when it comes to Carols is many people’s favourite. They have certainly done it justice with this version as there is a little prelude before the Cello’s come in with the main harmony and slowly other areas of the orchestra work their way into the familiar tune. It was intended that these versions of the songs would be an excellent backdrop for the Christmas season, but additionally they should be music that could be sung to as well if that is something you wanted to do. With these tracks that are well known they have kept the arrangements relatively straight forward, with a bit of an intricate introduction and then into the main body of the music. There are some rather grand openings, such as the amazing organ opening up It Came Upon A Midnight Clear.
Along with the classics and the medleys there are some less well known tracks, including From The Squalor Of A Borrowed Stable by Stuart Townend which has never really broken out of the church in the way that it should have done, because it is a truly beautiful song. A track that I am not terribly familiar with is Overture: Hansel and Gretel originally composed by Engelbert Humperdinck which is included on this album and shows that this orchestra aren’t afraid to take on something a little more rare and challenging. The last medley on the album is the A Festival of Carols which combines another whole load of well known tunes starting with Hark, The Herald Angels Sing these even re-cover some ground with different interpretations of some carols that have appeared previously.
This may not be the most high-brow of orchestra’s but I think that they have done a great job with these arrangements to bring these carols to life as instrumentals. These could easily play in the background throughout the whole of the Christmas period, through dinner parties, family gatherings and more, additionally they could be used for a little bit of Carol worship too for small groups or personal worship. I’m not a big orchestral or classical music fan but I really enjoyed these and appreciate the talent from every member of the orchestra.
A Festival of Christmas – Prom Praise celebrates Christmas – All Souls Music
Main Photo Credit: Jack Sharp via Unsplash
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Sorted discusses the big issues of the day – focusing on subjects as diverse as culture, sport, cars, health, faith, gadgets, humour and relationships. We aim to be positive and wholesome in all we do. And we have been achieving this since 2007.
Every printed issue of Sorted is read by more than 100,000 men in 21 different countries – while digitally, the number of people reading our online content (free and via subscription) continues to soar.
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