Christmas is… any number of things, I suppose. For you, the listener, Christmas is perhaps the sound of the first off-key carolers of the season, the first snowfall, or the absence of Thanksgiving leftovers on your dinner plate. For me, I encounter Christmas in an African-American spiritual, Appalachian, English, French, German, and Latin carols, and in a small town of my dreams. In reality, Christmas is where our hearts are at. Mine is in and among the snow-shrouded forests that make up the Pine Curtain, a place where music, imagination, friendships, and simple hope dwell. It is a place you can find yourself at when you listen to Christmas in the Pines.
