Arbor Ridge Studios Releases Christmas Benefit Album

The always amazing dudes at Arbor Ridge Studios have put together an absolutely gorgeous Christmas album to benefit the Gathering Church in Chapel Hill.

Christmas Nights is a collection of traditional Christmas hymns “chosen and arranged to evoke the feeling of nighttime in the Advent season, and the anticipation of Christ’s arrival on Earth.”

Among the artists who contributed to the album are Jeff Crawford (The Tomahawks, Mandolin Orange), Brett Harris, Nick Jaeger (The Tomahawks), James Wallace (The Light Pines, Mandolin Orange) and Mark Simonsen (The Old Ceremony). The tracks feature vocal contributions from Andrew and Emily Frantz from Mandolin Orange, Josh Moore and Skylar Gudasz.

“When [Associate Pastor Chris Breslin] approached me with the idea of recording a Christmas EP, I was a little timid to jump into a genre which has been well trod by many an artist,” Crawford explained. “I knew that we had to assemble a certain team of musicians familiar to … the Church to accomplish the task.”

Christmas Nights was recorded over a three-week period at Arbor Ridge Studios with Crawford, Harris, Jaeger, Wallace and Simonsen as the core band.

“Rearranging these standards proved to be a challenge and an opportunity for us to convene as a group and record together, which we don’t usually have,” Crawford said.

The traditional Christmas songs include “O Come O Come Emmanuel,” “O Little Town of Bethlehem,” “Oh Holy Night,” “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear” and “Beautiful Star of Bethlehem,” as well as the instrumental “Because the Night is Long.”

The album will be released Dec. 2 with a free concert at Reality Center in Durham; it is also available digitally or in a limited-release sleeve through Bandcamp for $5.

Jeff Crawford serves as the music director for the Gathering Church, which meets every Sunday at Creekside Elementary School. To check out the music program for Dec. 2′s Hymn Sing album release show, click here.

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