Hampton String Quartet - What If Mozart Wrote "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas"

Not Extraordinary, but Worth Buying

It's probably as hard to listen to this CD objectively as it was to write and perform objectively!

In short, what it is - or at least is intended to be - is a series of musically-meaningful compositions, scored for string quartet, whose underlying thematic material just happens to be certain famous Christmas melodies. That is, several skilled arrangers took Christmas songs for thematic material, and composed "serious" string quartets around them. So it's somewhat like, for example, Handel composing the "Harmonious Blacksmith" around a theme he heard a blacksmith whistling, and Dvorak composing the Moravian Duets around Czech folksongs, and so forth, except that the melodies are probably a lot more familiar to most of us!

As you can undoubtedly imagine though, when you're listening to it, it's easy to lose sight of the "serious" musical value, or not, of these arrangements, given the obvious non-seriousness of the fact that the melody they're building that fugue upon is "Do You Hear What I Hear?"! So it's easy to conclude that despite having a serious overall feel to them, they're actually just intended as "musical jokes."

I should be careful with the word "serious," though. It's fundamentally intended as light-hearted music: basically Divertimenti, but not musical jokes. It's clearly not like Mozart's "Ein Musikalische Spass," where it's really obvious that the treatment of the material is masterfully done badly for humorous effect. These give me the impression of at least of intending to be skillfully-composed and -performed musical treatments of perhaps way-too-familiar thematic material. Of course it's also clear that this well-done-by-intent musical treatment is also intended to be light and fun. However, I don't think they're fundamentally intended to be funny, as such, although they sometimes seem that way.

So, the conclusion I've drawn from listening to it a couple times, is that whether or not they're intended as serious compositions isn't what I should be focusing on. If I want to listen to them for pure musical value that's fine, but if the thematic material makes me laugh, that's fine too.

So then, the question is whether they have good musical value independent of the thematic basis. In short, I'd say, that some are better done in that regard than others, but I'd say that they're worthwhile listening to whenever the mood is right. And it's certainly an amusing fun stunt to write, and listen to, this sort of music. January 3, 2008

My favorite Christmas CD

My parents picked up this recording when I was a child and it became for me the quintessential Christmas music. Several years after I moved out on my own I begged them for the tape to make a copy (shh, don't tell) and to my horror discovered that it had been lost. I moped for years and spent quite a bit of time trying to track it down to no avail. Then I discovered it here on Amazon and have been made happy again. It is such a refreshing change from traditional Christmas music (which I also love) and even as I write this review in August, the tunes play in my mind. Get this CD and you won't regret it--I promise. This is the first and probably only review I'll ever make and it's all in honor of my favorite CD in my collection. August 6, 2006

HSQ Does Christmas (again)

If you liked the original "What If Mozart Wrote 'Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas'"
by The Hampton String Quartet on the RCA Red Label, you'll love the digital re-recording of many of these tunes by the original artists, The Hampton String Quartet, on "HSQ Does Christmas (again)."

This new recording ( Sept., 2005) by HSQ features eight favorites from the "What If Mozart" album ("Frosty," "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas," "The Christmas Song," "Rudolph," "White Christmas," "The Little Drummer Boy," "Winter Wonderland," and "Let It Snow"), plus three new arrangements ("O Little Town of Bethlehem," "Greensleeves" and " "We Wish You A Merry Little Christmas").

The CD is available on the web at the MonaLisaSound.com website and on Amazon. You'll also find three rock CDs by the original rock string quartet, The Hampton String Quartet. "Take No Prisoners," the latest CD, is HSQ at its best - "Sweet Dreams Are Made of This," "Paint It Black" and "Heartbreaker" are just a few of the standouts on this CD. Have fun! December 29, 2005

Pleasant change-up in your holiday music

A cute little christmas album.

If you like lite classical or classical pop, you'll probably get a real kick out of this quaint little 1986 offering by the Hampton String Quartet. The arrangements are all offered in a serious way - what if all these Xmas tunes were given a classical string quartet arrangement? The efforts range from the predictable to the outstanding (The faux-fugal arrangement of DO YOU HEAR WHAT I HEAR? is a high point).

The MOZART in the title is somewhat misleading, though. Warren Schatz (producer) attempts different classical styles (in his wish for "The perfect Christmas album") besides old "Wolfy." WHITE CHRISTMAS is a bit more Beethoven-y than Mozartian, and THE CHRISTMAS SONG is definately in a Debussey vein.

If you can find this one for a decent price, snap it up.

Originally on the RCA Red Seal Digital label. December 1, 2004

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