|
|
Did you ever wonder why of all the holidays in the year, Christmas has more songs than any other holiday? And if you think you have to wait for Christmas Day or even Christmas Eve to hear all these great and not so great songs, there are radio stations all over the country that start playing Christmas songs right after Thanksgiving. Why wait?
The truth is, we can't wait for that magical time to come around when the radio stations start playing our favorite Christmas songs. There are so many of them, performed by so many artists, that you can listen for days and not hear the same song more than once.
There are songs from just about every era of music too. You've got your great Bing Crosby classic "White Christmas" from 1942 all the way to the 2005 classic "Christmas Time For The Jews" performed by Darlene Love on Saturday Night Live in one of the funniest and probably best segments they've done in many years.
Yes, the Christmas songs keep coming and coming. Every year we look forward to the new ones that come out in the hopes that a new classic will be born. But we still love the old songs, no matter how many times we hear them.
Some are very traditional and you come to expect their playing each year; songs like "Jingle Bells", "Silver Bells", "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town" and other tunes along the lines of the ones we used to learn when we were in school. No, we weren't very hip back then and you weren't going to find any off the beaten track tunes coming up at a school Christmas concert.
But thanks to some very talented and odd people, we do have some Christmas songs that are not so traditional and also quite a few that are very strange to say the least.
Of the more talented and beautiful of these songs you need look no further than "Happy Xmas" as performed by the late John Lennon. Over 30 years after this song was recorded, a plea for peace in our world, this song is still played on radio stations all over the world.
For the more bizarre, you need look no further than "Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer" as recorded by Elmo and Patsy. This song become such a huge hit that they eventually made a cartoon movie out of it in the year 2000. Someday this song may fade into obscurity, but as of today it is one of the most requested Christmas songs each year.
Then of course you have your Christmas songs that you hear in Church on Christmas Even and Christmas Day service, such as "O Holy Night", "Away In A Manger", "Joy To The World", "O Little Town Of Bethlehem" and of course "Silent Night", which usually concludes most Christmas Eve services as we put out our candles.
Yes, Christmas music most certainly does make the holiday season that much more special. Hopefully, as the years go by, more and more great Christmas songs will be written to help remind us what a truly magical time Christmas really is.
Michael Russell
Your Independent guide to Christmas
© Copyright 2007 by Michael Russell
Top of Page
|
|
|
|
