Recess! Media

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That’s the Montreal Ornithological Orchestra with a chorus of goldfinches, geese, cuckoos, crows, larks, loons, orioles, robins, swallows, tanagers, and turtle doves with a version of an old holiday favorite that’s sure to put a chirp in your step.

It’s another delightful musical flight from Robert LaFond, the Canadian musician, composer, and impresario, who’s been doing unusual, ear-opening works for anumber of years. On this CD, called Christmas Noel, LaFond weaves together segments of actual bird songs and sounds with traditional secular and sacred holiday melodies, including this unforgettable version of the “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy”:

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If you can’t spot these wonderful birds at your local music store, perhaps you can locate LaFond’s other holiday album,Snoopy’s Nutcracker. It’s part of his Snoopy’s Classiks on Toys. It might sound a little hokey, but you haven’t heard the “Russian Trepak” until you’ve heard it played on toy pianos and horns.

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