![]() ![]() Why It’s a Gift: Nearly 45 years later, there is still nothing normal about watching one of most successful mainstream entertainers of the ’30s to ’50s share a mic with the transcendently weird/wired Bowie. Here are Billboard‘s staff picks for the 100 greatest Christmas songs of all time - songs that, try as folks might, no amount of commercial overplay or corporate co-opting can seem to ruin. It makes every Christmas season a musical family gathering where everyone shows up and co-exists peacefully - something precious few of us are lucky enough to be able to say about our actual families’ real-life holiday celebrations. Perennials that date back the better part of a century at this point are still ubiquitous every holiday season, while new seasonal releases often take whole decades to prove their worthiness. Unlike the oldies and classic rock canons, which are forced to update their timeline parameters every so often (or at least shed some old songs to make room for the new), being a Christmas standard is a lifetime appointment. Well, maybe for ten months of the year, it goes into hibernation - but you know it’ll be back next November at the latest, and it’ll include the same songs it has for your entire life. It’s music for the most wonderful time of the year, even if it always makes you cry.Īnd it never goes away. It evokes a visceral, nearly oppressive sentimentality, one fortified and strengthened by a lifetime’s worth of associated holiday memories - personal, familial, romantic, nostalgic. But when they do connect, it’s magic – not to mention a holly jolly payday.Ĭhristmas music has a wavelength entirely its own, shared by an overwhelming majority of its most recognizable classics: a sublime yearning that’s at once profoundly saddening and deeply comforting. Some succeed, as with these modern Christmas classics others, which just dropped this year, have yet to prove their mistletoe mettle. And with each passing year, more than a few contemporary artists try their hand at crafting a new seasonal standard, something sweet and melancholy that lingers in the pine-scented air for as long as it takes you to finish a candy cane (without chewing, that is). People have been singing about Christmas almost as long as it’s been celebrated. The things that make Christmas songs great - whether carols, old pop standards or newer enduring hits - are most of the same things that make pop great in general: emotional connection, universal relatability, unshakeable catchiness. ![]() I added that the record’s sale must have brought those two beautiful songs closer to many people who had not known them too well before.” 3.There’s a reason that listeners seem to get more impatient every year for the Christmas music season to start: Nothing else feels quite like it. “I told the simple truth - that I had intended no sacrilege by singing in my usual ballad manner. “They said that neither my voice nor my styling was suited to such spiritual songs,” Crosby told Good Housekeeping in 1956, via Wikipedia, also referring to a recording of “Adeste Fideles.” ![]() “Silent Night” is a Christmas carol written in Austria in the early 1800s. “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” was written by Kim Gannon and Walter Kent. This moving ballad tugs at the heart strings when the protagonist sings “I’ll be home for Christmas if only in my dreams.” That's partly because in the original version, originally sung by Bing Crosby in 1943, Americans were overseas fighting in World War II.Įlvis Presley included a stellar version of the track on his 1957 album “Elvis’ Christmas Album.” The irony is that Presley spent Christmas of’ ’58 and ’59 away from home in Germany as he had been drafted by the Army. 'It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year' by Andy Williams We recommend the stellar version by Chicago soul singer Jerry Butler, who released it in 1960. “O Holy Night” has been recorded by artists of all stripes, from Mariah Carey to Celine Dion. John Sullivan Dwight translated “O Holy Night” into English and gave it a progressive tone for its times with the line, “Chains shall He break for the slave is our brother.” It became popular in abolitionist circles of the times. (Adams predated the American Jewish songwriters of the 20th century who would compose many of Christmas classics we love today.) The birth of Jesus is the redemption of man and woman, rejoice on this “O Holy Night.” The classic has an interesting background as it was composed by Placide Cappeau, an atheist, and Adolphe Adams, a Jew in 1840s France. The hymn “O Holy Night” is a seasonal show stopper that stirs the soul whenever it’s played on the radio - and it moves attendees to tears at Midnight Masses, too. View Gallery: Asbury Park Boardwalk unveils The Giving Tree in the Grand Arcade ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |