Description
As he gathered the material for his first Christmas album, Paul Kelly soon realised that a collection of 10 seasonal standards could never cover the richness he wanted to convey. He knew he wanted to make a record that drew out all the emotions and layers of the Christmas story, and to do it in a way that reflected our experience in the southern hemisphere.
The result is Paul Kelly’s Christmas Train, an extraordinary 22-song double album which travels across the centuries, from a Latin hymn to well-known carols, from a traditional Irish folk ballad to songs with an unmistakable local flavour, and a sparkling new version of one of the greatest Australian Christmas songs of them all, Kelly’s own How to Make Gravy recorded 25 years after it initial release.
The sacred and the secular, the ancient and modern, all carefully woven into a collection destined to become a part of Australian Christmases for many years to come. It is delivered by Kelly and his band with a big cast of Christmas helpers including vocalists Marlon Williams, Waleed Aly, Lior, Emma Donovan, Kasey Chambers, Kate Miller-Heidke, Vika & Linda Bull, Alice Keath, Sime Nugent, Alma Zygier, Emily Lubitz, Jess Hitchcock and Dhungala Children’s Choir, and contributions from the Kelly clan including nephew and band-mate Dan, siblings Mary-Jo and Tony and Paul’s daughters Maddy and Memphis Kelly.
