CHRISTMAS SONGS

Christmas music is a cottage industry. Almost everyone who is anyone has at least a Christmas song out, or even a whole album. And even a lot of people who no one ever heard of, have Christmas songs that have become huge hits. The good thing about Christmas songs is that they can have a long shelf life. I am certain that many of these songs would make good podcasts. For instance, Elmo and Patsy recorded Grandma got run over by a Reindeer in 1979 for forty thousand dollars. It is still popular during the holidays and has made Elmo a multi millionaire. It would be nice to interview him but he might be tough to get, especially during the holidays. He does over a hundred radio interviews and countless TV programs as well.

According to CNN, the biggest selling Christmas album of all time is the Elvis Presley Christmas Album, with over nine million albums sold. One of the songs on the album is the Irving Berlin classic White Christmas, which happens to be the number one Christmas song of all time. Upon hearing the Elvis Presley version of his song, Irving Berlin called radio stations to have the song and the whole album banned from the radio. Fortunately, almost everyone ignored Irving. Blue Christmas is the most popular song on the album and is the number two Christmas song of all time. Elvis supposedly did not want to record “Blue Christmas.” He was forced to record it by the producer, so he tried to do a version that was so bad that nobody would like it. Boy, was he wrong. Someone at work, who shall remain nameless, had the song on for almost the whole day one year. I was sick of it that day. It is, however, a terrific Christmas song.

Another song that might make a good podcast is Little Drummer Boy, which has been around since 1941. I didn't even know what the song was about until I read the lyrics. I guess I must've kept my focus on the pa rum pum pum pum. It is about a little boy who goes to see Jesus in his manger. He is very poor and does not have any gifts to bring to the newborn King. So he asks the Virgin Mary if he can play the drums for Jesus. She said yes, so the little boy played the drums and Jesus smiled at him. One of the lyrics to the song is “The ox and the lamb kept time.” What was going on on that manger? And how were they keeping time? With their feet? It is, however, a terrific song and one of my favorite versions is the unlikely pairing of Bing Crosby and David Bowie. It was recorded on September 11, 1977. David supposedly did it because his mother liked Bing. David starts out the scene on the TV program "Bing Crosby's Merrie Olde Christmas" asking Bing as he opens the door. “Hello...are you the new butler?” Bing laughs and replies, “Well, it's been a long time since I've been the new anything.” Bing was right. He died a month after that. Bowie hated the song and did not want to play it, so Ian Frazier, Larry Grossman and Buzz Kohan wrote the Peace On Earth part for David to sing.

Anyway, I could go on and on about the stories of Christmas songs but I gotta do some shopping. I will leave you with some lyrics to the Peace On Earth part of the song.

“Peace on earth, can it be
Years from now, perhaps we'll see.”

Let's just hope it's sooner than that.