Tonight's share is "A Child is Born", a recording of selections from the Advent-Christmas Liturgy sung by the Trappist Monks of the Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani. The Abbey was founded in 1847 near Bardstown, Kentucky and is still active today, with around 40 monks in residence.
The album "A Child is Born" was recorded in 1955 and released in 1956. It includes extensive liner notes and a transcription of the Advent-Christmas liturgy. It was a Columbia Masterworks album, catalog ML 5310.
I love albums of this sort for their historical value and deeply spiritual presence in the performances. It's an experience with an aspect of Christmas that we don't get to include in our typical celebrations.
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| Liner notes insert page 2 |
Now, the bad news. 😟 The album has some unrecoverable scratches, and I was not able to rip all of the tracks. What I could get transferred is presented in three segments: Side 1 tracks 2-13, Side 2 tracks 1-2, and Side 2 tracks 4-5. The rest were just not repairable. If you like the segments that you hear, I'm sure there are other sources of the album somewhere. I felt that it was a notable enough record to go ahead with a partial share, along with the usual album artwork and the four pages from the inner sleeve.
And as you can see, the front cover has some damage as well.
So, I hope you enjoy selections from "A Child is Born" by the Trappist Monks of Gethsemani.
I think you bought this one with me! At a Goodwill in Orlando, I remember lamenting the damage done to the cover from the library attachments. Sorry about the rough shape, but that's how these things go sometimes. :(
ReplyDeleteYep - it was at that Goodwill. Damage notwithstanding, it's worth a buck :-)
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