Mele Kalikimaka! Several items this Christmas morning: The Mormon Tabernacle Choir performs “Joy to the World” from “The Wonder of Christmas” album performed at Temple Square in Salt Lake City in 2006. I have posted two of these nearly every year for the past ten: “Yes Virginia”, the story of Francis P. Church’s New York …
Originally posted December 2017 Without further ado, we’ll listen as Michele Obama reads “Twas the Night Before Christmas,” Clement Clark Moore’s wonderful 1823 poem. Moore didn’t acknowledge his authorship until he published a book of poems in 1844. There’s apparently an ongoing dispute among some literati and academics as to whether he was the actual …
Originally posted December 2015 That could only be Frank Sinatra accompanied by Nat King Cole singing “The Christmas Song,” written by Mel Tormé and Bob Wells on what Tormé claimed was the hottest day of the year back in July of 1945. Here’s Mark Evanier relating his tale of Mr. Tormé at the Farmers’ Market …
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Originally posted December 2018 Tom Caufield performs an instrumental version of “Silent Night” on guitar. From Wikipedia: The song was first performed on Christmas Eve 1818 at St Nicholas parish church in Oberndorf, a village in the Austrian Empire on the Salzach river in present-day Austria. A young priest, Father Joseph Mohr, had come to …
Last posted in December 2015 I haven’t posted this in a while (not since 2009, to be exact), and I’d forgotten how cute the cartoon is. The animation was done by cartoonist Joshua Held back in 2002. The song was performed by The Drifters on their Christmas album, released in 1954. Here’s an interesting note …
Yesterday it was “city sidewalks” from “Silver Bells,” so let’s have another song about a city. Originally posted December 2019 Mary Chapin Carpenter sings “Christmas Time in the City,” from her “Come Darkness, Come Light” album. It was released in 2008, so I’ve been promoting it for 14 years and will probably do so for …
Originally posted in December 2008 I hear this song and immediately think of snow falling between skyscrapers, piling up below window displays, and viewed through neon lights (in short, I think of Rockefeller Center in New York). You’d think, given the first line of the song, that people mashing up video would use city street …
Originally posted December 2012. This was the first song the duo at the restaurant I had brunch at today played after setting up their ukulele and stand-up bass. Here’s local girl Bette Midler singing “Mele Kalikimaka” from her 2006 album “Cool Yule”. The song was written in 1949 by Robert Alexander Anderson, another local. He …
Ofiginally posted December 2017 Canadian Loreena McKennitt sings “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” from her “Midwinter’s Night Dream” album released in 2008. It is one of the oldest of the English carols, dating back to at least the 16th century. The first printed version appeared in 1760. It’s even referred to in Dickens’s A Christmas …
Originally posted December 2015. A now-deceased college fraternity brother of mine posted this clip on Facebook earlier in 2015 and I liked it. It’s by a group called Pastiche, friends of Andy’s from his San Francisco days as a DJ. They’ve put out three CDs and worked as backup vocalists for many recording sessions. I’m …