Jingle All the Way

iTunes Review

Not since John Fahey's 1968 album The New Possibility: John Fahey's Guitar Soli Christmas Album have instrumental Christmas carols sounded equally intricate and beautiful. Multi-Grammy award winning quartet Bela Fleck & The Flecktones heat up a diverse platter of 16 familiar yuletide faves with Fleck's dexterous banjo virtuosity accompanying bass, flute, saxophone, percussion and klezmer mandolin. The band fuses progressive bluegrass with bits of avant folk, world music, jazz, traditional gypsy folk, and ‘70s-inspired funk to adorn an assorted musical tree of Holiday jams. The world renowned Alash Ensemble helps open the album, singing on an animated version of "Jingle Bells" with the lyrics translated to their native tongue. They return mid-album for an incredible reprise providing some hypnotizing Tuvan throat singing, joined only by spare banjo notes similar to Bruce Langhorne's 1970 score for The Hired Hand. Fans of the 1965 animated classic A Charlie Brown Christmas will gush over the cover of Vince Guaraldi's "Linus and Lucy" with members of The Flecktones each taking solos hotter than a fresh batch of gingerbread cookies. After all the fast-paced picking, a mellowed take on Joni Mitchell's "River" bookends Jingle All The Way with the cozy warmth of a fire crackling below a row of hanging stockings.