Holiday Christmas Piano is a new solo piano collection of ten Christmas tunes arranged and performed by Isadar. This is Isadar’s 13th solo piano project and his third Christmas album, following In Search For the Meaning of Christmas (1999) and O Christmas (2012) (both are reviewed on MainlyPiano.com). All of the pieces on this album are traditional Christmas gems that are on the more religious side (as opposed to Santa songs), and all will be familiar to most listeners. Isadar’s arrangements stay true to the original melodies with distinctive rhythms and embellishments that also make them his own. It’s a great collection suitable for background music as well as for more active listening. In the album credits, Isadar notes that “there was no Artificial Intelligence (AI) used in the making and production of this album.” How sad that it even needs to be mentioned!

Holiday Christmas Piano begins with “Joy To the World.” Isadar makes very effective use of the piano’s dampers to create a shimmering, ethereal effect before going into the main part of the song. Played quickly with most of the left hand playing rolling broken chords, it is truly an expression of joy! After a flowing introduction, “Good King Wenceslas” becomes light-hearted and almost playful. “God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen” is a song that adapts well to a lot of different musical styles, and Isadar keeps it rather dark and mysterious - I really like his arrangement and original touches! “The First Noel” is much lighter and more peaceful with some improvisatory passages between the verses. The very old “Wassail Song” also has improvisations between the verses and the contrasts in musical styles is really interesting! Isadar keeps the melody for “O Little Town of Bethlehem” traditional, but the accompaniment feels much more modern, as do the original passages between verses. I really like this one, too! “Deck the Halls” is one of those songs that does well with high-energy enthusiasm or a slower and more thoughtful approach. Isadar’s arrangement combines both very successfully, starting out stately and more formal for the first verse, then picking up the tempo with a catchy rhythm, then gently flowing, and a big finish - a great arrangement! “Away In The Manger” is the first Christmas carol many children learn in Sunday school, and Isadar’s arrangement expresses that sweet innocence and includes gentle interludes between verses. “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing” focuses on the melody of the song for the verses, and then segues to more contemporary-styled interludes between stanzas. The album comes to a close with “O Holy Night,” which has a somewhat livelier left hand rhythm than you usually hear, but that works to give the song a rather unique interpretation.

If you are looking to add to your Christmas music collection this year, Holiday Christmas Piano is a good choice! It is available to stream and download from Amazon and Apple Music/iTunes as well as on streaming services including Spotify and Pandora.