Imagine going to Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve expecting solemnity… and suddenly hearing a succession of popular tunes, some decidedly chirpy, in the music that the choir is singing.

Good humour aplenty infuses the Baroque composer’s blend of sacred and secular Recommended Recording: The Sixteen/Harry ChristophersĬharpentier: Messe de Minuit pour Noël (c.1694) The mass’s opening is identical to that of the motet, though sadly without the jolly antiphonal ‘Noe’ sections that follow in the original. It is a truly special work, as expansive moments that rock seamlessly between the two choirs are contrasted with quicker dance-like sections.

Writing for two independent choirs in this manner was a relatively new practice: evidence that even late in his career Palestrina was still pushing boundaries. The work is a wonderful example of poly-choral writing: Palestrina heightens the interaction between the two choirs by using contrasting voicing, one high choir, and one low. It was written in 1575, during Palestrina’s second stint as choirmaster of St Paul’s Basilica in Rome. Palestrina’s Missa Hodie Christus Natus Est is a parody mass: namely, a reworking of an earlier motet of the same name. The Renaissance great greets Christmas with an immaculately crafted choral gem It’s time to start exploring… Palestrina: Missa Hodie Christus Natus Est (1575) Below, we select our 12 favourites, one for each Day of Christmas, and five stocking-fillers to complete the yuletide scene. They sent back a sackful of replies, with suggestions ranging from Liszt magnum opuses to charming Brahms trios. So, we asked BBC Music Magazine’s panel of experts to name the works that they believe deserve to be more familiar. But, in terms of larger-scale Christmas works, that’s pretty much it. If you’re lucky, you may get to wallow in the pleasures of a Berlioz L’enfance du Christ or a Schütz Christmas Story or two or, on a more intimate level, the intricate delights of Messiaen’s Vingt regards sur l’enfant-Jésus for solo piano or his La Nativité du Seigneur for organ. The best recordings of Handel’s Messiahīach’s Christmas Oratorio will doubtless get a few welcome run-outs this season, and the high-voices-with-harp combination of Britten’s Ceremony of Carols is always guaranteed to pull in a crowd.

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