Christmas with Sufjan

(above, Sufjan Stevens)

I'm not a big fan of the "Now Listening To" category of self-revelation through musical taste, but I must share some music with you all, that I've been listening to extensively this season. You may have heard of Sufjan Stevens' music; he's been getting more and more college-radio play, and such-like. I was first introduced to him by friends a few years ago, and have grown to love his music. (A good friend of his, is Denison Witmer...with whom I graduated from high school, and still count as a friend...and you will hear his background vocals on some of the following songs...just droppin' names here...) Sufjan brings an innocence - but not naivete - and freshness to his songs that few others of my generation are able to pull off. He also makes amazing use of bells, flutes and banjos.

His Christmas albums from the past few years, initially made for close friends, have been passing underground from hand to hand for a while. This season I'm listening to his last two holiday albums over and over. It's beautiful, fun and luminous stuff...I'm moved in some way every time I listen to his renditions of old songs I knew from way-back-when.

Anyway, here's a way to get some downloads of his Christmas music:

http://www.chattablogs.com/quintus/archives/019666.html

Here's his main website, with links to labels he's connected with:

http://sufjan.com/ ...and his own record label: http://www.asthmatickitty.com/main.php

He's already "big" - he's playing the Lincoln Center in January...but hey, wouldn't you if you had a chance?