SAVAE, La Noche Buena

Label: World Library • Genre: Christmas Music of Colonial Latin America

If you want warm music that’s appropriate for the holidays

yet still has the thrill of the unusual, you can’t do better

than this mesmerizing disc from the San Antonio Vocal

Arts Ensemble. The Spanish conquest of America produced

a rich mixture of indigenous Latin American, West

European and West African musical forms. Written half a

millennium ago by Spanish, Portuguese and Native

American composers, these vigorous songs incorporate

influences and instruments such as the teponaztli log drum,

huehuetl drum, maracas, soprano recorder, wooden rattle,

ayacaxtli gourd shaker, bells, cabasa,

djembe, tambourine, coyolli jingles, guiro,

chicahuatzli rain stick and more.