The Search

Cow was in the moo-d for a little Christmas music.

In particular, she had heard a great live version of "Carol of the Bells" performed by the high-school band. How hard, she thought, would it be to find a good CD of that?

Very hard, it turns out. After about two days of looking at CDs with the handy "listen" feature so you can hear bits of them, Cow found:

--many, many albums of Christmas music played so slow the musicians must be on Ambien (hello David Archuleta, Barry Manilow and Jim Brickman)
--albums of strange combos (cajun-easy-listening provided by Michael McDonald)
--albums with Too Much Orchestra or chorale backup (Faith Hill, Straight No Chaser)
--albums with so much electric guitar the ear quails (shudder, Mannheim)
--albums with just the right acoustic backing, where you can actually hear one violin instead of 50, but with such excruciatingly bad vocals (Bob Dylan's Christmas in the Heart) the reindeer and any children within range would be crying from fear. In fact, Cow listened to every preview track of this album, entranced with horror, at just how badly these songs can be sung.

Cow did purchase an album: Alison Brown Quartet, Evergreen, a quirky mix of banjo, mandolin and some vocals. Link not provided because Cow only tells you this to inform you, not to sell you things. But Cow wishes all good luck on their search through "brass-only", "country-only", "easy piano-only" "jazz-only" Christmas music and hopes they find just what they are looking for!

Moo!