This could be the first time you have heard Silent Night. The arrangements and juxtaposition of these Christmas favorites sum total a whole new experience in holiday cheer. Enjoy an earful, rich in variety- semi-chamber, legit, jazz – voom – modern- which will alter your listening outlook. These contemporary variations are a happy set to augment your season’s joy with their effulgence. This is an investment in your Christmas keepsakes, which are brought out each season,
evoking joyful reminiscences as good tomorrow as they are today. The dazzling effect of the 3 dimensional cover combines with the full stereophonic sound of the group and creates a new approach to our Christmas favorites. Here is a harp album, honest in its approach, depending on no gimmicks. The combo enhances the harp, relying on the arrangements for integrity.
Betty Glamann, whose harp is the pivot point of the music, is a classicist with an appreciation for growth and change. Her background encompasses the classical to the jazz idiom, most unusual credentials, to replace the harpist stereotype.
After three years with the Baltimore Symphony, Betty set out to extend the frontiers of the harp. She joined the late Spike Jones group and her new education began. Her experience expanded with radio work, recordings, commercials, Broadway, TV guest spots on the Garry Moore, Steven Allen, Arthur Godfrey, and other shows. In her long association with Duke Ellington as featured soloist, she proved her versatility and adaptability. Betty has established a place for the harp in the world of modern music. This niche was reinforced with the late Oscar Pettiford. Here she starred in records and with his big band in Birdland. Then from the big band to Oscar’s septette and more night club work. Betty’s protean career has put the harp on the map of modern music.
Now we have Betty Glamann and her “3D” approach to the Christmas favorites. The cover, in harmony with the music, is a “first”, created by Victor Anderson and his 3D studios. Here is a new blend of sight and sound to extend your horizons of perception.
The Arif Mardin arrangements of your Christmas favorites are here treated in a very unique manner. Ravel and Debussy- like harmonies are transformed into shimmering bell sounds. On some, there is an infectious light jazz beat combined with the noble sound of the harp, flute, French horn, oboe, and cello- moments of sheer beauty. These varied arrangements are written by Arif Mardin. The harp solo- Noel Noel- was arranged by the soloist, Betty Glamann.
Arif Mardin, producer-arranger for Atlantic Records, was born in Istanbul, Turkey. It is interesting that his formal music training came after a BA and postgraduate work in economics. A self taught pianist, he received a scholarship to the Berklee School of Music in Boston, from which he graduated and later taught. His compositions and arrangements have been recorded by Dizzie Gillespie, Herbie Mann, and many others. He arranges for the Young Rascals and Aretha Franklin.
