To Drive the Cold Winter Away is Loreena McKennitt's second album, released in 1987. It pays homage to her childhood memories of music for the winter season, the most vivid of which “came from songs and carols recorded in churches or great halls, rich with their own unique ambience and tradition.”
To capture that remembered ambiance, McKennit kept the arrangements sparse, celebrating the beauty of simplicity. She also chose to leave the found sounds of life in the performances, which were recorded on location in churches and great halls:
- The Church of Our Lady in Guelph, Ontario, Canada
- Glenstal Abbey, A Benedictine Monastery near Limerick, Ireland
- Annaghmakerrig (The Tyrone Guthrie Centre) in County Monaghan, Ireland
Read more about To Drive The Cold Winter Away: Track Listing, Song Information
Famous quotes containing the words drive, cold and/or winter:
“Ha, ha, my ship! thou mightiest well be taken now for the sea- chariot of the sun. Ho, ho! all ye nations before my prow, I bring the sun to ye! Yoke on the further billows ... I drive the sea!”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“Prepare your hearts for Death’s cold hand! prepare
Your souls for flight, your bodies for the earth;
Prepare your arms for glorious victory;
Prepare your eyes to meet a holy God!
Prepare, prepare!”
—William Blake (1757–1827)
“These were such houses as the lumberers of Maine spend the winter in, in the wilderness ... the camps and the hovels for the cattle, hardly distinguishable, except that the latter had no chimney.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)