''A Christmas Cornucopia'' is the fifth solo studio album, and the first Christmas album, by Scottish singer-songwriter

Annie Lennox Ann Lennox (born 25 December 1954) is a Scottish singer-songwriter, political activist and philanthropist. After achieving moderate success in the late 1970s as part of the new wave band the Tourists, she and fellow musician Dave Stewart w ...

, released in November 2010. It was Lennox's first album after signing to the

Universal Music Group Universal Music Group N.V. (often abbreviated as UMG and referred to as Universal Music Group or Universal Music) is a Netherlands, Dutch–United States, American multinational Music industry, music corporation under Law of the Netherlands, ...

(

Island Records Island Records is a multinational record label owned by Universal Music Group. It was founded in Jamaica by Chris Blackwell, Graeme Goodall, and Leslie Kong in 1959, and was eventually sold to PolyGram in 1989. Island and A&M Records, another ...

in the UK,

Decca Decca may refer to: Music * Decca Records or Decca Music Group, record label * Decca Gold, classical music record label owned by Universal Music Group * Decca Broadway, musical theater record label * Decca Studios, recording facility in West ...

in the US and Canada) following her departure from

Sony BMG Sony BMG Music Entertainment was an American record company owned as a 50–50 joint venture between Sony Corporation of America and Bertelsmann. The venture's successor, the revived Sony Music, is wholly owned by Sony, following their buyout o ...

, which had been her label for almost 30 years.

Background and release

The album is a collection of Lennox's favourite Christmas songs, though includes one original track written by Lennox, " Universal Child", which was released digitally as a single on 12 October 2010. A music video for Lennox's version of the classic Christmas carol "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" premiered on 4 November 2010, which was released as the second digital single from the album. A tenth anniversary special edition of the album was released on 20 November 2020 including a new recording, " Dido's Lament". A choral version of "Dido’s Lament" performed together with ''London City Voices'' (a non-audition community choir based in London) was donated to

Greenpeace Greenpeace is an independent global campaigning network, founded in Canada in 1971 by a group of Environmental movement, environmental activists. Greenpeace states its goal is to "ensure the ability of the Earth to nurture life in all its biod ...

. The official video begins with the following quote by Annie Lennox: "When it comes to climate catastrophe, we are on the edge of abyss. I really believe we don't have much time left to make an effective change. We are looking at a civilization on the downwards side. This is the truth of this matter. It's staring us in the face, and we are not paying any significant attention—continuing on as if it doesn't exist. I see Dido's Lament as a lament for our dying planet."

Reception

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

gives ''A Christmas Cornucopia'' a weighted average score of 73 based on 9 reviews, meaning "generally favorable reviews". Ian Wade of

BBC Music BBC Music is the arm of the BBC responsible for the music played across its services. The current director of music is Lorna Clarke. Officially it is a part of the BBC's Radio operational division; however, its remit also includes music used i ...

gave the album a very positive review, saying "this collection could find itself becoming as much a part of the holiday season as arguments with loved ones." Sal Cinquemani of ''

Slant Magazine ''Slant Magazine'' is an American online publication that features reviews of movies, music, TV, DVDs, theater, and video games, as well as interviews with actors, directors, and musicians. The site covers various film festivals like the New Yor ...

'' awarded the album 3.5/5 and said "Lennox seems more inspired on A Christmas Cornucopia than she has in years." John Hunt of ''Qatar Today'' magazine gave the album 9/10 and said "in particular, the vocal work and musical arrangement of 'God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen' are impactful to the point of being intimidating."

Track listing

Commercial performance

As of January 2011, ''Christmas Cornucopia'' has sold 179,000 copies in United States.

Personnel

*Annie Lennox – accordion, African drums, African percussion, arranger,

dulcimer The term dulcimer refers to two families of musical string instruments. Hammered dulcimers The word ''dulcimer'' originally referred to a trapezoidal zither similar to a psaltery whose many strings are struck by handheld "hammers". Variants of ...

Fender Rhodes The Rhodes piano (also known as the Fender Rhodes piano) is an electric piano invented by Harold Rhodes, which became popular in the 1970s. Like a conventional piano, the Rhodes generates sound with keys and hammers, but instead of strings, t ...

, flute,

harmonium The pump organ or reed organ is a type of organ that uses free reeds to generate sound, with air passing over vibrating thin metal strips mounted in a frame. Types include the pressure-based harmonium, the suction reed organ (which employs a va ...

, keyboards,

marimba The marimba ( ) is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars that are struck by mallets. Below each bar is a resonator pipe that amplifies particular harmonics of its sound. Compared to the xylophone, the mari ...

, orchestral arrangements,

pan pipes A pan flute (also known as panpipes or syrinx) is a musical instrument based on the principle of the closed tube, consisting of multiple pipes of gradually increasing length (and occasionally girth). Multiple varieties of pan flutes have been ...

, percussion, piano, pipe organ, producer, reed organ,

santur The santur ( ; ) is a hammered dulcimer of Iranian origin.--- Rashid, Subhi Anwar (1989). ''Al-ʼĀlāt al-musīqīyya al-muṣāhiba lil-Maqām al-ʻIrāqī''. Baghdad: Matbaʻat al-ʻUmmāl al-Markazīyya. History The santur was invented ...

, string arrangements, triangle,

vibraphone The vibraphone (also called the vibraharp) is a percussion instrument in the metallophone family. It consists of tuned metal bars and is typically played by using Percussion mallet, mallets to strike the bars. A person who plays the vibraphone ...

, vocal percussion, vocals, whisper, whistle,

Wurlitzer The Rudolph Wurlitzer Company, usually referred to as simply Wurlitzer, is an American company started in Cincinnati in 1853 by German immigrant (Franz) Rudolph Wurlitzer. The company initially imported stringed, woodwind and brass instruments ...

*Dave Robbins – conductor * Mike Stevens – arranger, bass, drones, engineer,

glockenspiel The glockenspiel ( ; or , : bells and : play) or bells is a percussion instrument consisting of pitched aluminum or steel bars arranged in a Musical keyboard, keyboard layout. This makes the glockenspiel a type of metallophone, similar to the v ...

, acoustic guitar, nylon string guitar, keyboards, mixing, music box, orchestral arrangements, organ,

Hammond organ The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert, first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding #Drawbars, drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, sound was created ...

, oud, African drums, producer, programming, string arrangements, strings *Barry Van Zyl – African drums, percussion *The African Children's Choir – vocals ;Technical *Matt Allison, Marcus Byrne – engineer *Heff Moraes – mixing, mixing consultant *Mike Owen – photography

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

Release history

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Christmas Cornucopia, A Annie Lennox albums 2010 Christmas albums Christmas albums by Scottish artists Decca Records Christmas albums Island Records albums