“7 years between albums is a perfectly reasonable amount of time”

Merry Christmas

For Christmas This Year we decided to record a small 'EP' of 4 songs to share with friends and family. Partly because it is fun, and partly to justify the expense of maintaining an entire recording studio in the largest room in our house.

We sincerely hope you download and enjoy the songs.

You can 'Right Click' (or 'control click' on a Mac) the NAME of the song on the right hand side and save the songs to your desktop, add them to iTunes, burn them to a CD, listen to them on this site, or just lie and say that you listened to them and enjoyed them thoroughly.

Barbecue - This song is from "Emmet Otter's Jug Band Christmas" and is one of my oldest memories of Christmas time. It is a wonderfully endearing and slightly depressing Muppet movie. This is the song that Emmet and his jug band play in order to win money to buy Christmas presents that year. Cassandra killed it on the violin. Thanks, C!

Matt Vanacoro - Piano, Everything Else, Backing Vocals
Holly Benedict - Lead Vocals
Pat Benedict - Lead Vocals
Jess Vanacoro - Backing Vocals
Cassandra Sotos - Amazing things on a violin

Frosty the Snowman - We had a great time recording this song. Jess should front a big band. I wish we had real horns.

Matt Vanacoro - Piano, Fake Horns, Fake Drums, Fake Bass, Fake Trumpets

Jess Vanacoro - Vocals and general jazziness
 

Oh Christmas Tree - I love Herbie Hancock. I rip off his style in my own playing constantly. I mean... I'm inspired by him. This is one example of that.

Matt Vanacoro - Piano, Drums, MachFive 3 Upright Bass That Kind Of Sounds Real

Jess Vanacoro - Vocals
 

Sleigh Ride - I've always thought Jess sounds like Karen Carpenter. Major props to the Benedict family for providing tons of backing vocals during Thanksgiving feast time.

Matt Vanacoro - Piano, Drums, Strings, 'The Christmas Sound', Percussion, Vocal Arrangement

Jess Vanacoro - Vocals

Pat Benedict / Holly Benedict / Eileen Benedict /
''Big' Ron Benedict - Amazing backing vocals

Cassandra Sotos - Violin