Winter: An Origin Records Holiday Collection

A nice Christmas album from a quartet of players from the Origin stables. The bulk of the album is taken up with standards for the season, with a couple of old English carols thrown in, as well as a couple of new compositions by guitarist Dave Peterson (and a stray Horace Silver number). The tone taken throughout the proceedings is a full one, with thick notes on the sax and a good sustain on the guitar. Overall, the sound is very warm, very fresh, reminiscent of a smoky live performance with a theme to the session. A very nice instrumental replacement for the basic sung Christmas standard albums, this one seems made for seasonal party background music.