Favorite/Most Hated Christmas Song

[hagopian]

The only song I managed to come away still liking was, believe it or not, "White Christmas".

Like NS, I admit to a guilty pleasure of giving "Merry Christmas, Darling" - Carpenters....an ok...

Think I should admit that playing the same songs for as many years as we all did, finished me for most of the tuneage.

I can't even write the name of a certain Quebecoise, without flinching.

Merry Chrimble to all of you and for those new to the West Coast - welcome to the Pineapple Express.

[skyvalleyradio]

My favourite Christmas tune is Vince Guaraldi's "Linus & Lucy" from the original Charlie Brown Christmas special. It's really more of a 'winter song' but has become part of the Christmas music landscape. Runner-up has to be Charles Brown's "Please Come Home For Christmas"

Most hated hands down has to be Elmo & Patsy's "Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer" with dishonorable mention to Brenda Lee or any Xmas toonz by Burl Ives

[Neumann Sennheiser]

My favourite Christmas tune is Vince Guaraldi's "Linus & Lucy" from the original Charlie Brown Christmas special. It's really more of a 'winter song' but has become part of the Christmas music landscape. Runner-up has to be Charles Brown's "Please Come Home For Christmas"

Most hated hands down has to be Elmo & Patsy's "Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer" with dishonorable mention to Brenda Lee or any Xmas toonz by Burl Ives

Hmm, we seem to be on the same page of opinions you and I.
Coincidentally, I just heard Charles Brown sing "Merry Christmas Baby" leading off KPLU's daily Blue-Plate Special today at noon.
Nice!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMfGPZI59Zw

[J Kendrick]

My favourite Christmas tune is Vince Guaraldi's "Linus & Lucy" from the original Charlie Brown Christmas special. It's really more of a 'winter song' but has become part of the Christmas music landscape. Runner-up has to be Charles Brown's "Please Come Home For Christmas"

Coincidentally, I just heard Charles Brown sing "Merry Christmas Baby" leading off KPLU's daily Blue-Plate Special today at noon.
Nice!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMfGPZI59Zw

I'm sorry... But it just ain't Christmas yet...

Until somebody finally plays "Snoopy's Christmas"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RKHq5b3 ... re=related

[skyvalleyradio]

Neumann: I loaded both Charles Brown songs amongst others today into the CFSI Xmas library just about to go into rotation late this week.

[jon]

Make that another vote for Charles Brown's "Merry Christmas Baby". I first heard it within the last year, but was wondering if I had got mixed up on the artist, as I didn't see it in the Whitburn books I consulted. But, obviously not. A great Christmas song.

Anybody know what year it is from?

[Steve Sanderson]

Make that another vote for Charles Brown's "Merry Christmas Baby". I first heard it within the last year, but was wondering if I had got mixed up on the artist, as I didn't see it in the Whitburn books I consulted. But, obviously not. A great Christmas song.

Anybody know what year it is from?

"Merry Christmas Baby," first done by Charles Brown in 1947 .

http://www.mistletunes.com/early.html

[Neumann Sennheiser]

Ken Schram on KOMO this afternoon related a great story on how Mel Torme and lyricist Bob Wells came to write "The Christmas Song"
(a.k.a. ...Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire).
It seems in July of 1945, Mel arrived at Wells' un-airconditioned home in suburban San Fernando Valley (where it's always at least ten degrees warmer than L.A.) on one of the hottest summer days on record for Southern California, finding his friend and writing partner in t-shirt and tennis shorts with every electric fan he owned blasting full-on. The work plan for the day was for the pair to hammer out a score for some now forgotten movie they had been engaged to work on.
While waiting for Mel, Bob Wells had been also trying to cool off by doodling cooling winter memories of his New England childhood.
“I saw a spiral pad on his piano with four lines written in pencil,” Tormé recalled. “They started, ‘Chestnuts roasting ... Jack Frost nipping ... Yuletide carols ... Folks dressed up like Eskimos.’ Bob didn’t think he was writing a song lyric. He said he thought if he could immerse himself in winter he could cool off. Thirty-five minutes later that song was written. I wrote all the music and some of the lyrics.”
As quickly as the song was written, it took a full year for Nat King Cole to get into a studio to record it, but his record finally came out at last in October of 1946, well in time for Christmas, and that version charted not just that year, but multiple times since.
Of course it's also been recorded by probably a hundred or more other artists through the years including Frank Sinatra, Michael Buble,
Twisted Sister! : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zY7l6DyMJo0
Sesame Street's Big Bird and even, of course, Mel Torme himself.
The Nat King Cole original is still the one best known and was a landmark in the history of race relations as the first top Christmas song hit for an African American artist.

[drmusic]

As a followup to the above story, read this:

http://www.povonline.com/cols/COL245.htm

[jon]

Great little story! Hard to believe that it has been over 11 years now since Mel Torme's passing.