COMPOSERS: Various
LABELS: Decca
WORKS: Carols & Christmas Songs
PERFORMER: Bryn Terfel (bass-baritone); Welsh National Opera Orchestra/Tecwyn Evans
CATALOGUE NO: 477 8768
Through digital trickery Bryn Terfel joins Bing Crosby in a remake of ‘White Christmas’. Elsewhere his baritone is in ruddy health, breasting enthusiastically through a series of Yuletide favourites in occasionally rather sugary and fussy arrangements. Rolando Villazón guest-slots in El Nacimiento, and Catrin Finch plays harp on some tracks, including a couple on the Welsh-language bonus disc. Terfel, for my taste, points textual meaning too insistently where simplicity of utterance is better – at least he isn’t dressed up as Santa on the cover. Terry Blain