The impulse to make a holiday album can strike at any point in a performer’s career: as a way to get noticed, a quick follow-through to early success, a diversion between larger efforts, an iconoclastic joke, occasionally even a testament to faith. Familiar songs are reworked, with or without twists, alongside a few new ones. Here, music critics of The New York Times review the year’s most notable new holiday albums.

SUFJAN STEVENS: ‘SONGS FOR CHRISTMAS SINGALONG’ (Asthmatic Kitty). While others are content to release short and casual just-for-fun holiday CDs, the overachieving indie-rocker Sufjan Stevens is thinking bigger. This five-disc boxed set collects his four previous ”Songs for Christmas” mini-albums and adds a fifth, along with chord progressions, stickers, a poster and lots of liner notes. (To be honest, most Christmas albums are rip-offs, but this one certainly isn’t; you should be able to find it for under $20.) The new CD includes half a dozen originals, including ”Christmas in July,” a wistful but restless ode that alternates between 10/8 and 9/8 time. Then there are the perennials, including ”Jingle Bells” (played on ”insipid piano,” according to the liner notes) and ”Lo! How a Rose E’er Blooming” (”multiple pianos, played very earnestly”).