Song Spotlight: Auld Lang Syne (2008 edition)

Last year before New Year's Eve, I made a post rounding up all the free versions of "Auld Lang Syne" that I had found. I've found a few more this year - some are brand new, some from years past, but all of them are pretty cool in their own way - and I thought it might be cool to make an annual tradition out of an "Auld Lang Syne" post, celebrating the end of another year of great free Christmas music and allowing the new year to be rung in with style.

Here are this year's versions of "Auld Lang Syne":

• Mojo Green's version from their Green Christmas album. This is my favourite version, with their rock instrumentation balancing nicely with the more traditional sounding piano accompaniment.
• Richard Rayer's version from A Garritan Community Christmas Volume 5. This is an orchestral, instrumental version (done on a computer, like all Garritan Christmas recordings).
• Navada Van der Veer's version from Voices of Christmas Past. Being from 1921, this is by far the oldest version of the song I've heard, so the historical value alone makes it worth hearing.
• The Sleeping Brothers' version from The White Christmas Album. This is a short, countrified version.
• Peter Buffett's version from Star of Wonder, with vocals by Kim Robertson. This is a pretty, softer version with some Celtic overtones. (this one requires registration with amiestreet.com. I registered there earlier this year for free, and as far as I know, it is still free to register. If anyone has any problems registering or accessing this album, please let me know)
  

The funny thing about this song is that I've never actually gone looking for it - all of these versions are part of Christmas albums that I've found - but it's really become a favourite of mine. That's certainly a long way from just thinking of it as "that New Year's song", after hearing it used on TV and in movies any time a New Year's Eve scene comes up.

I guess that's it. Thanks so much for reading this blog again this year. I've had a lot of fun tracking down, listening to, and writing about the music I've featured here, and I can't wait to do it again next year. In the meantime, if you're up for some free non-Christmas music, the Totally Free Music blog has a years' worth of posts in it now, and I should be actively posting in it again really soon (actually, I just made a post about a metal compilation called Christmas Carnage Vol. 1 - there's no Christmas music on it, but the artwork does have some pretty bows and a skull wearing a Santa Claus hat!). Happy New Year, and happy listening!

URLs:
http://www.archive.org/details/mg2006-12-00.-xmas
http://garritan.com/Xmas.html
http://www.archive.org/details/Voices_of_Christmas_Past_1898_to_1922
http://www.archive.org/details/TheSleepingBrothersTheWhiteChristmasAlbum
http://amiestreet.com/music/peter-buffett/star-of-wonder/ (free registration required)