you should check out this site: Coope Boyes & Simpson and Wak Maar Proper, The Christmas Truce 1914: Kerstbestand No Masters NMCD14

http://fp.acappella3.f9.co.uk/the_christmas_truce_1914_-_kerstbestand.htm

a recording project of just the same thing, new music composed for the a capella choir, but beginning with songs documented as having been sung, and as I said in previous post, they were primarily carols. here's a review:

This CD has its basis in two significant events which took place near Ypres. One is the famous Christmas Truce which occurred in the Ploegsteert area in 1914 as well as other places nearby and the other is more recent - the launch of the Passchendaele Peace Concerts. As a result of the concerts, the English a capella trio Coope, Boyes and Simpson began a tradition of their own, performing with Belgian musicians to produce what I would call Musical Acts of Remembrance. Visitors to the "In Flanders Fields" museum in Ypres will have heard recordings (as part of the displays) of the two groups who contributed to this recording, the second being Wak Maar Proper, a local choir of about 60 people who take their music very seriously, both in terms of musicianship and in terms of the what the songs say.

This is not just a collection of Christmas Carols, although there are carols on the CD. There are songs about the Christmas Truce, too, but the CD isn't just about that either. The performers explore and comment upon, through song, the real legend of the Christmas Truce - how people who were enemies one day can become friends the next and enemies again the day after, and what they learned (and what there is for us to learn) from it. The songs explore exactly what it is that makes people enemies and often concludes that while the enmity might be real enough when it comes, the underlying cause may be trivial. Wak Maar Proper call themselves a "Wereldkoor" - a "World Choir" and their repertoire encompasses songs from many countries. It seems quite apt, therefore, to hear them sing "Senzenina," a Black African protest song. The people who created it were, like the British battalions and German Regiments around Ploegsteert in 1914, ordinary people caught up in extraordinary events which they did not themselves bring about.

Anyone familiar with the distinctive Coope Boyes and Simpson treatment of songs won't be disappointed. I specially liked "The Christmas Truce" written by Jim Boyes and the enthusiastic sound which the "whole company" produces in "While Shepherds Watched" which is sung to the tune "Pentonville." Because of the precision required to sing the tune, the carol can begin to sound dirge-like but the power of the Wak Maar Proper voices keeps it gloriously buoyant. It immediately became my favourite recording of this version of the carol!

Christmas Truce 1914 is produced by No Masters Co-operative Ltd.

The CD's number is NMCD14

It can be ordered direct from No Masters Co-operative using this email link.