1219: The Saint and the Sultan (Berlin Classics), the latest recording by Mehmet Cemal Yeşilçay and his Pera Ensemble, commemorates the 800th anniversary of Francis of Assisi’s journey to Damietta, Egypt, the economic heart of the 13th-century Muslim world, to convert the sultan al-Malik al-Kamil.

In Jack Finney’s short story “I Love Galesburg in the Springtime,” ghosts from a small town’s past—a streetcar, a horse-drawn fire engine, a phone call from the dead—inexplicably “flicker into existence again” as a way of standing athwart progress and yelling, “Slow down!” “Galesburg’s past,” writes Finney, “[was] fighting back.”

Something similar may explain the apparently insatiable appetite for 50th-anniversary box sets.

Every Single Star

Dori Freeman

Rare is the Dori Freeman review that doesn’t mention her producer, Teddy Thompson. And, to be fair, whatever he’s doing or isn’t doing certainly isn’t hurting. But, frankly, the Americana-country that Freeman purveys is so pure, simple, infectious, and direct that the only way a producer could do her wrong is to get in the way. And no producer worth his salt would even dream of getting in the way of “I’ll Be Coming Home” and “Like I Do,” the motherhood songs of the year, hands down.

Llegó Navidad

Los Lobos

These songs, mostly South American folk favorites played for all their sprightly worth by a band that at this point probably couldn’t play them any other way, emphasize the season’s less-religious aspects—festivity for festivity’s sake, one might say. Spanish speakers, however, will recognize an exception in the opening track, “La Rama,” which bases its festivity on Christ’s birth and His virgin mother’s beauty. In other highlights, the band has a go at doing for Freddy Fender and José Feliciano what it once did for Ritchie Valens.

Kanye West’s film Jesus Is King, which documents one of West’s gospel-extravaganza “Sunday Services,” garnered more than $1 million during its weeklong run in IMAX theaters.

The good news for those unable to score a ticket is that there’s another musical Sunday Services project worth investigating.

Folk Music of China, Vol. 2

Various artists

“Everybody wanted Yandhi. / Then Jesus Christ did the laundry.”

So raps Kanye West in “Selah,” one of 11 tracks from his new album, Jesus Is King (Getting Out Our Dreams II/Def Jam). Perhaps you’ve heard of it. It’s only the most talked-about (and written-about) album of the year so far.