ALBUM REVIEWS : CD Packages for Classical Christmas

The classical labels slowed the pace of Christmas releases just a tad this year, perhaps in view of the now roughly 16,000 classical Christmas titles already in the marketplace, a third of which feature a cherubic boys’ choir backing up a millionaire opera star.

Still, there are dozens of new titles with us this season.

Here are a few of the more notable, non-cliched ones.

All discs are full price, meaning around $15 in stores, unless noted as mid-price releases, which tend to sell for around $12.

“Sing We Christmas,” Chanticleer (Teldec). Selections by this protean a cappella male vocal ensemble--billed as the only such full-time professional outfit in the country--range from medieval to contemporary. One highlight is a very cool new harmonization of “Lo, How a Rose.”

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“December Stillness,” Dale Warland Singers (American Choral Catalogue). All 20th century music here, but most of it in the nonthreatening language of such folks as Rachmaninoff and Poulenc. In fact, this is squarely in the Music-for-Quiet-Contemplation mode so favored by the labels just now. But it’s nicely chosen and nicely done, by one of the premier vocal ensembles in the land.

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Handel’s “Messiah,” featuring the Mormon Tabernacle Choir (NightPro, three discs). A stylistic flashback that defies the march toward smaller, leaner, more historically authentic realizations of this piece. Anything that says “Mormon Tabernacle Choir,” with its 325 members, is guaranteed at least some attention. And this one even can claim a legitimate conductor, in the person of Englishman Sir David Willcocks. Included is a third CD in which Willcocks rehearses and explains the piece and tells jokes.