FEATURE:
Inside the Christmas Classic
PHOTO CREDIT: Peter Fazekas/Pexels
Can You Revise or Reinvent a Seasonal Standard?
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IT may sound a bit early…
but I have been thinking about Christmas music and what makes a classic. You can’t really get away from the season. We already are being inundated with Christmas food in supermarkets and shops! I struggle to think why we need a three-month run-up when it comes to Christmas food! There will be presents and other bits filtering in soon enough. Maybe we will wait until December but, very soon, artists will be announcing Christmas singles. We will be preparing ourselves for multi-generation classics that never seem to get old. I am very interested in the new crop of songs. The artists tackling the standards. How everything from a Mariah Carey anthem through to classics from Slade and Paul McCartney seems to be fresh. New generations discovering them. I have been inspired by a book from journalist and writer Annie Zaleski. This Is Christmas, Song by Song: The Stories Behind 100 Holiday Hits is fascinating. Published last year, I would recommend people check it out:
“Celebrate the merriest season of the year with award-winning author and music journalist Annie Zaleski's collection of the 100 most popular and beloved holiday songs of all time.
'Tis the season! Break out the eggnog, hang the mistletoe, blast those Christmas songs, and settle down in your favorite armchair with this beautifully illustrated volume exploring well-known and lesser-known behind-the-scenes stories of the 100 most cherished holiday songs of all time and their everlasting impact. From artists such as Bing Crosby and Ella Fitzgerald all the way up to Mariah Carey and Ariana Grande, this all-encompassing collection of holiday favorites (called one of "the 25 best Christmas books of all time" by Book Riot) is sure to warm your heart during the merriest season of the year.
What song was listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the best-selling single of all time? Which popular Christmas tune was reportedly written to commemorate Thanksgiving? What holiday song led to a special meet-and-greet between the song's 10-year-old singer and a 700-pound hippopotamus?
Spanning musical genres and decades of classics and modern hits, some of the featured songs include:
“White Christmas” by Bing Crosby
"All I Want for Christmas Is You" by Mariah Carey
"Deck the Halls" by Mannheim Steamroller
“Christmas Tree Farm” by Taylor Swift
“Christmas Time (Is Here Again)" by The Beatles
“Feliz Navidad” by José Feliciano
"Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" by Gene Autry
"You Make It Feel Like Christmas" by Gwen Stefani
“Santa Baby” by Eartha Kitt
“Rockin’ around the Christmas Tree” by Brenda Lee
“Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays” by NSYNC
“Run Rudolph Run” by Chuck Berry
And many more!
Including full-color illustrations throughout, this gorgeously packaged compendium is the perfect gift for you and your loved ones to experience the holiday magic year after year”.
PHOTO CREDIT: Lucie Liz/Pexels
It is fascinating reading stories behind Christmas classics. Songs spanning back decades. Ones that our parents would have listened to. More modern examples that have the potential to be heard for decades more. Every Christmas, we get this run-in where you hear that blend of the older songs from the 1950s and 1960s. Then you get a mixture from the 1970s and through to the 1990s. It is always satisfying having that instant and familiar connection. Maybe it is because we hear them from such a young age that they stick in our heads. They soundtrack a magical and peaceful point of the year. When we are all together and there is this mood of happiness and giving. A time to swap gifts and be around family. I am really interested in the stories behind Christmas standards. The songs that are synonymous with that time of year. Of course, now is a moment when we think what Christmas songs will come from modern artists. If you prefer the established songs that have been embedded into our minds for years or like more contemporary songs from Taylor Swift or Gregory Porter, there is this growing and expanding playlist that will resonate with all generations. Pretty much something for everyone. I don’t agree that Christmas songs or cheesy or saccharine. I mean, some can be, though think of the richness and quality the very best of the best. Choruses that can match the absolute best. So catchy and infectious. The mood you get on White Christmas or Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.
I am excited already to hear that first taste of Christmas music! It provides a sense of comfort and something to look forward to. Seeing what new Christmas songs will come around. There are quite a few articles out there that debate the merit of newer Christmas songs and whether they can compete with the all-time best. Can anything match All I Want For Christmas Is You by Mariah Carey?! That giddiness! The warmth and tenderness you get from Winter Wonderland. It is hard to compete with those songs we are all familiar with. I do wonder whether there is any way that new Christmas songs can have the same sort of impact and legacy as older ones. Although there have been some great ones from the past few years, do they have the necessary ingredients and potent blend that gets inside the head and lasts for years?! I do think books like Annie Zaleski’s are useful guides and invaluable resources. It is not only nostalgia and familiarity that means we keep coming back to the same Christmas songs. That they get the most play on radio and in stores. There is a more cynical and commercial reason. That recognition makes people want to buy and remain in a shop. Something new and unfamiliar might not make them linger as much. It is that trigger inside us where we remember back to Christmases past and these wonderful songs that scored some amazing moments. I don’t think that new Christmas tracks are completely out of the race.
It is good that modern artists cover Christmas standards and classics, though it is always interesting to hear a new take on the holiday. Maybe few could equal Mariah Carey or Wham!, though I do think that there are potential future-classics waiting to be released. Incredible voices and phenomenal talents that can craft something timeless. I think we get more diversity now. Not beholden to a particular sound or theme. Artists are faced with the choice or either sticking with cliches and over-familiar images and words one associates with Christmas or to take a modern approach. There is something romantic and innocent in classic Christmas songs. Sending our a less joyful or familiar message might put people off. Also, because of the world we live in, should artists reflect something more realistic? The commercialism of Christmas. Religion not really playing into it. There are articles like this that ask whether there is a magic formula when it comes to writing a Christmas hit. There are always like this and this that ask why there are very few new Christmas songs:
“Studies have shown that our general taste in music has become sadder, slower and generally more miserable than it was 50 years ago. 2017 in particular was one of the bleakest years in pop music history, with more minor key number ones and songs in downbeat tempos than normal.
With all that doom and gloom in our ears all year, it makes sense that we’d gravitate towards major key music during the season of goodwill. And if the music we’re making these days is less upbeat, it’s no wonder that we’re continually drawn back to the songs of yesteryear.
Let The Bells Ring
From the tubular chimes of Band Aid, to the sleigh bells of Winter Wonderland, to the jingling of Jingle Bell Rock, we have conclusively proved that we are total suckers when it comes to bell-based percussion.
You can barely move in the Christmas discography without bumping into a clanger of some sort. Bells are absolutely everywhere, refusing to let a quaver go by unmarked. For the most part they’re supposed to be evocative of Santa’s sleigh (with the occasional bit of church campanology) and their hypnotising effect on us is so profound that the simple addition of bells into a regular pop song can trick us into mistaking it for a full-blown festive classic.
For example, there was a conscious decision taken by the record label to add bells into the mix of East 17’s “Stay Another Day”—a song that’s actually about the heartbreak of suicide—to make it fare better in the competitive Christmas charts.
It worked a treat. The song has very little in the way of seasonal flair otherwise yet it managed to beat Mariah Carey’s undisputed classic “All I Want For Christmas Is You” to number one, and became one of the final songs to make it into the official Christmas canon (since we apparently stopped taking applications in 1994).
The Most Wonderful Time
Most pop music we know and love is written in a basic 4/4 count. Naturally then, it follows that the vast majority of Christmas songs are written in 4/4 too—but there’s an interesting exception.
A handful of our well-loved Christmas classics are written in 12/8. “Happy Xmas (War Is Over),” “Lonely This Christmas,” “Christmas Time (Don’t Let The Bells End)” and everyone’s problematic fave “Fairytale Of New York” all work to that relatively rare time signature.
Not only that, but there are a couple of non-festive songs that were Christmas No.1s which are also in 12/8 too. “Too Much” by The Spice Girls. Alexandra Burke’s cover of “Hallelujah.” Last year’s Christmas No.1, “Perfect” by Ed Sheeran. All 12/8.
What is it about 12/8 that feels so seasonal? Western pop music might be in 4/4, but a lot of our most cherished Christmas traditions stretch back to 19th century Central Europe, an area famous for its 3/4 waltzes
12/8 effectively acts as a compromise between these two time signatures, and therefore these two traditions. With four sets of three quavers in each bar of 12/8, you get your regular, radio-friendly 4/4 pop beat as well as the sort of triple-count found in both a classic Viennese waltz and in a lot of carols (“Away In A Manger,” “Silent Night,” “We Three Kings”).
It’s the perfect blend of old and new. A nod to tradition while keeping things modern.
Christmas Future
All of this raises an interesting question. If the hallmarks of a successful Christmas song are so obvious, why hasn’t there been one that’s really gripped the public imagination in the past 25 years?
It’s not as if Christmas albums aren’t still big business. Every major artist worth their salt has done a cover of “Santa Baby”, or released a non-specific holiday album in late November—and they continue to do so. Sia, one of the world’s most successful and well-respected songwriters, put out a whole album’s worth of original Christmas material last year, but you can safely bet that Chris Rea is going to see more season-specific airplay than she will.
We’ve never been so granular about the production of music than we are in 2018, so why doesn’t this sort of theoretical nuts-and-bolts approach produce any massive modern hits?”.
Even if we are less beholden to new Christmas songs and there is perhaps less excitement and impetus for artists, I do still believe that there is room for new interpretation and stories. It is hard to break that familiarity of the classic and same songs we keep coming back to. Even if the new breed might not be able to match the spirit and joy of Slade or the sway and strange beauty of Fairytale of New York (featuring the late Shane MacGowan and Kirsty MacColl), I do feel there is potential. Modern Christmas classics waiting. We are yet to see what 2024 has to offer for new Christmas songs. We need to instilling artists the importance and value of a Christmas song. How, unlike normal songs, they can last and be passed through the generations. The fact they are attached to a very powerful and joyful time of years creates a bigger rush than a song that is about or released at any other time of the year. For those bah-humbugs who say only older Christmas tracks are valid and we will never get any modern-day gems, I would urge people to keep their eyes and ears open for gifts we may receive…
IN years to come.