Writer's Block: Name that tune

[royalmarriage]

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Oh, loads. Anything on Queen's Greatest Hits II, for a start, which I seem to listen to very often in the car to and from work. Large chunks of Pet Shop Boys output (well, I am a fan; speaking of which - three weeks to go until the O2...), especially Always on my mind, which always gives me a certain...primal thrill (and I end up playing air keyboards to it...so much less messy than air guitar...). And of course, at this time of year, one gets reminded about Fairytale of New York. The original, unexpurgated, Kirsty MacColl and the Pogues version. Accept no substitutes, and we'll just forget to mention that the former prevented the latter from being the Christmas number one it so deserved to be...

Comments

[miss-next.livejournal.com]

For me, there is only one answer. It is a mediaeval French song called Enfin la beauté que j'adore, set for tenor and lute, and it has to be the version recorded by Charles Daniels and Jacob Heringman on the album Airs de Cour... though I doubt there is another recording available.

Charles brings out all the feeling in anything he sings, but this is special. I think I first heard it in about October or November 2005, and I don't know how many times I've listened to it since, but it still stops me in my tracks every time. It's a nice enough song, but probably not in itself the best that's ever been written; it's just that when Charles sings it, he's transcendent.