Shawn Colvin's seasonal album is in effect a musical adaptation of the children's book Lullabies & Night Songs, which, like the CD, features illustrations by
Maurice Sendak. As such, it includes mostly traditional tunes, along with some Christmas standards such as "Silent Night" and "Christmas Time Is Here," and several
Alec Wilder compositions and arrangements, among them settings of lyrics by Robert Louis Stevenson and
Rudyard Kipling. Often employing a string quartet,
Colvin turns in calm but deeply felt performances of the songs for a set appropriate for putting the children to sleep on Christmas Eve.
–
William Ruhlmann, Rovi