For four decades, Windham Hill Records’ A Winter’s Solstice compilations have provided a quietly enduring alternative to the usual holiday soundtrack, swapping seasonal bombast for fingerpicked guitars, reflective piano solos and the contemplative beauty of instrumental music. To mark the 40th anniversary of the original collection as well as the label’s own 50th birthday, many of its defining artists have reunited for A Winter’s Solstice Celebration, a 14-track album of new recordings that extends the series’ legacy while honoring its roots.

The independently produced collection features Windham Hill founder Will Ackerman, pianists Liz Story and the late George Winston, guitarist Alex de Grassi, multi-instrumentalist Barbara Higbie, bassist Michael Manring, pianist Jim Brickman and other longtime members of the label’s extended musical family. It was co-produced by Dawn Atkinson, a longtime Windham Hill exec who oversaw six volumes of the original series, as well as former Windham Hill staffer Bob Duskis and Ackerman serving as executive producer. A Kickstarter campaign raised more than $65,000 to bring the project to fruition, with the artists retaining ownership of their recordings.

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“I always love hearing from people that the Winter’s Solstice albums are still part of their holiday celebrations,” Atkinson says. “Those recordings have meant so much to so many listeners over the years. This album will be more than a reunion — it will be a bridge between past and present, resulting in something beautiful that carries the story forward.”

Founded by Ackerman, whose first recording was financed with a $300 loan from friends, Windham Hill quickly established a signature instrumental sound through clean, melodic, acoustic-forward compositions that were both intimate and transportive (it was also perpetually maligned by the descriptor”new age music,” which its artists came to detest). The company’s A Winter’s Solstice series became one of its most enduring achievements, with the original 1986 album earning Platinum certification for U.S. shipments of a million copies.

The new collection offers numerous poignant connections to Windham Hill’s history. Philip Aaberg’s “Carol for Ukraine” was premiered live in December 2025 and recorded shortly before the pianist’s death in May, while the Winston solo piano piece “Winter Sunflower” is receiving its first release. The album also reunites Montreux — the ensemble of Darol Anger, Higbie, Mike Marshall and Manring — for a gorgeous new recording of Manring’s “Welcoming,” a composition that originally appeared on his 1986 Windham Hill debut, Unusual Weather, and the belated 1990 compilation The First Ten Years.

Ackerman’s contribution, “The Longest Night,” reflects the Vermont landscape that has inspired so much of his music. “It is ultimately a hopeful piece,” he says, describing the winter solstice as “that turning point, when the longest night is passing and winter will be turning to spring.”

For Duskis, the project was the culmination of months of soliciting and curating submissions, making sequencing decisions and reconnecting with the label’s far-flung musical community. Announcing the album’s release, he expressed the hope that it would become “a beloved part of your winter and holiday traditions.”

The album comes just before Windham Hill celebrates its 50th on Sunday (Nov. 1) at the Freight in Berkeley, Ca, where Ackerman, Story, de Grassi, Higbie, Anger, Manring, Scott Cossu, Fred Simon and Ira Stein will perform together for the first time in many years. The daylong event will also feature artist conversations, panels, rarely seen archival footage and a preview of A Quiet Revolution, Tal Skloot’s forthcoming documentary about the label.

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