02 - White Christmas
03 - The First Noel
04 - Oh Christmas Tree
05 - Silent Night
06 - What Child Is This
07 - Days Like Christmas
08 - Winter Wonderland
09 - Jingle Bells
10 - Away in a Manger
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For "6 String Christmas", Shawn went back to the basics--playing all of the instruments himself from bass to drums to keyboards and, of course, guitar. Shawn has a familiarity in multiple music styles and, consciously or unconsciously, all of those sounds and styles season his playing. You can hear the influence of Appalachia here and flamenco there, keeping the music fresh and original without disrupting the overall Smooth Jazz flavor. A few of these tracks would play very well in a New Age set while one or two others are more Jazz than Smooth. "White Christmas" and "Winter Wonderland" have the sound and feel of old school Traditional Christmas instrumentals. My personal favorites from the album are "What Child Is This" which is just Shawn on the guitar in a very nice arrangement featuring a bit of a Latin flavor, and "Days Like Christmas" (I gather an original) which is very pretty and reminds me of some of the beautiful Hawaiian music I love (not that its slack-key, just laid back). And the steel drums and island rhythms on "Oh Christmas Tree" make for a nice change of pace--both for the album and the song. Expect a lot of these tracks to turn up on Smooth Jazz holiday compilations in the years to come.
Nothing here rises to the level of essential, but "6 String Christmas" is a really nice yuletide listen, whether or not you're a big Smooth Jazz fan. Like a lot of independent releases these days, the digital version is widely available, but the hard copy CD seems to be available only from the Shawn Brock himself, at least for now.