Emmylou Harris
is an artist with the rare sort of voice that communicates an honest and firmly grounded humanity while possessing a crystalline purity that verges on the angelic. In short, she was a singer born to make a great
Christmas
album, and in 1979 she did just that with
Light of the Stable
, in which she fused the high-lonesome traditional sound she'd been exploring on
Roses in the Snow
and
Blue Kentucky Girl
with songs that honored the spiritual and emotional roots of the holiday season. The album's gestation began with a 1975 single of
"Light of the Stable,"
with most of the material recorded years later, but
Harris
and producer
Brian Ahern
gave the project an admirably unified sound, which speaks of Christmas with a quiet dignity that's celebratory but reverent -- this is one of the few
albums from a secular artist that scarcely mentions
Santa Claus
while focusing clearly on the birth of Christ.
Ahern
assembled a stellar cast for these sessions -- the pickers include
Ricky Skaggs
,
James Burton
, and
Rodney Crowell
, while
Willie Nelson
Linda Ronstadt
Dolly Parton
Neil Young
pitch in backing vocals -- but the results are a marvel of restraint, with precious little showboating and a handful of performances that rank with the performers' best work. If you're looking for a disc that will kick up your Christmas party a few notches,
isn't it, but if you want to hear music of quiet but compelling beauty which warmly resonates with the true meaning of the holidays, then you'll find this album is an experience to treasure. [In the liner notes to
Rhino
's 2004 reissue of
jokes that "We used to affectionately call the album the best-kept secret in the music business...that is why we could put it out with a different cover every year." While she exaggerates a bit, the 2004 edition of the disc did indeed feature its third set of cover artwork, as well as three new songs recorded especially for this edition. While the new songs display traces of the more adventurous approach
embraced on
Wrecking Ball
Red Dirt Girl
, they still fit comfortably with the album's original ten tracks, especially the lovely
"There's a Light"
"Man Is an Island,"
while the new mastering makes the most of the album's crisp, warm sound -- if
didn't exactly improve a masterpiece, she certainly gave it a new finish that reinforces the qualities that make it so memorable in the first place.] ~ Mark Deming