Glee: The Music, The Christmas Album Volume 2

Glee: The Music, The Christmas Album Volume 2 is the soundtrack album by the cast of the American musical television series Glee, released by Columbia Records on November 11, 2011.^[1]

Background

The album features twelve Christmas tunes: ten covers and two original songs. The original songs are both written by Adam Anders, Peer Åström and Shelly Peiken: "Extraordinary Merry Christmas" and "Christmas Eve with You".^[2] In addition to featuring twelve of the starring characters from the television show's third season (only Dianna Agron, Jane Lynch and Harry Shum, Jr. are not listed), all four of the finalists from The Glee Project are featured: Damian McGinty solos on "Blue Christmas", Samuel Larsen is featured with Cory Monteith and Mark Salling on "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town", and runners-up Lindsay Pearce and Alex Newell duet on "Do You Hear What I Hear?"

The album debuted on the Billboard 200 at number six, selling 71,000 copies in its first week.^[3]

Reception

Heather Phares of Allmusic gave the album a rating of three-and-a-half stars out of a possible five, and wrote that "listeners know what to expect" and the album "delivers just that". She praised Amber Riley's "All I Want for Christmas Is You" as "charming", Naya Rivera's "Santa Baby" as "mischievous", and Chris Colfer and Darren Criss for their "brassy, breezy" version of "Let It Snow". She did note that the album "flags" when "unfamiliar" songs are presented and singled out the original song "Extraordinary Merry Christmas" in this regard. She also criticized the final song of the album, "Do They Know It’s Christmas?", and described it as "overwrought".^[4]

Track listing

Personnel

Source: Allmusic^[5]

References