In my ongoing effort to encounter — and then share — some of the better weirdness of the intertubes (and thus, to prove that social media isn’t only a seething cess pool of the worst of humanity in which all blessedness, light and hope will drown — merely mostly so)*…here’s a musical interlude that demonstrates that not all Christmas music sucks, or at least, not all in the same way:
This musician has combined Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 3, Mozart’s Divertimento in D and Wham!’s pop Christmas staple to create a surprisingly beautiful cello arrangement of ‘Last Christmas’….
The arrangement and performance comes from Kjell Magne Robak, with camera work by Ragne Vicotria Stauri. Bravo, lads.
*The Language Police, Fugitive Run-on Division, will soon have me in custody, don’t you worry, not one little bit, no sirreee…or ma’ameee.1
1: Oh yes. I do self-indulge. Why do you ask?
swiftfox
You want holiday spirit – listen to classical!
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
I guess I’d have to go with the Little Drummer Boy. I don’t know why, but it drives me up the wall, around the bend and over the edge, et al.
lollipopguild
For me it is not one song it’s that so many versions of good songs are out there that are Just Badly Done. You have professionals who put out songs that are badly arranged and phoned in by the singer.
Eljai
My dirty little secret is that I have always adored the Wham! version, but that arrangement is really quite lovely!
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Trump finally went there
Trump should be looking at Ted Nugent.
pinacacci
Simply Having a Wonderful Christmas time. McCartney should be chained down and showered with tomatoes for that one.
Yutsano
Please no more Adam Sandler Hanukkah songs. The joke has run its course.
bobbo
There is only one approved Christmas song. “Christmas Wrapping” by the Waitresses. Everything else is torture.
randy khan
It’s probably got to be “The Little Drummer Boy,” but I could make an argument for “Do You Hear What I Hear?”
I have an odd fondness for “Christmas in Hollis,” by Run-DMC, which was on the first Very Special Christmas album. Part of it is the video, because they seemed to be having so much fun.
chopper
@bobbo:
hey now, don’t forget fairytale of new york.
randy khan
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Jared as chief of staff, huh? Would he have to give up his quest for peace in the Middle East to do that?
eclare
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Circling the wagons for what is to come
Litlebritdifrnt
Christmas songs that are not Christmas songs drive me mad. I used to listen to a local radio station that started to play “Christmas songs” from Thanksgiving onwards. Prime example was A weird song that “mentioned” “lit up like a Christmas tree” in it but had absolutely nothing to do with Christmas. Ditto “Greensleeves” nothing to do with Christmas. I am assuming because the song was later adapted to be a Christmas song, but other than that no clue.
chopper
“happy holiday” by andy fucking williams. ugh.
Anotherlurker
“Step Right Up”, by Tom Waits, is my favorite Xmas song.
“Suddenly Its Christmas” by Laudon Wainright III is the best intro to the Xmas Season.
C Stars
@randy khan: Do You Hear What I Hear is awful, just mind-grating.
For Holiday music I generally enjoy low-key noodling acoustic or celtic-y stuff, but when it verges into New Age melodramatic female warbling in the higher register I want to shoot the speaker. This has happened several times recently with Spotify holiday music stations. Mr. Stars insists that Spotify is what all the cool kids have but I actually prefer Pandora’s algorithm. Anyhoo… Anyone planning on ingesting some fine drinkables/edibles and watching Pee Wee’s Playhouse Christmas Special sometime in the next two weeks? Cuz I sure am.
sukabi
@eclare: think of it this way, that entire festering boil of a family can be rounded up in one swoop if he actually picks Jared….
I had an unrelated comment disappear into the ether.?
Mike in NC
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: It was reported today that Rick Santorum didn’t want the job either. Apparently he has standards!
jl
Not Christmas related, but as long as Bach came up on this almost top 10,000 full service blog, my Christmas present to all my beloved BJ commenters is a link to the PDQ Bach classic, Bach Protrait
This…. Is what Jack Bach said…..
Bach Portrait
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtW7cu56MRs
As for Christmas music, I heard there is a flap about the non-Christmas ‘Christmas’ tune ‘Baby It’s Cold Outside’. Supposed to be sexist. I’ve never listened to the words carefully, so I have to go check it out when I remember. But, in general, I am down on many non-Christmas tunes that have been adopted for Christmas, because they mention snow and a fireplace, or have a ‘Christmassy’ feel to the chord progression, or mention reindeer farts, or whatever.
JPL
I like the Holly and the Ivy, which is interesting because I’m agnostic at best.
Yutsano
@sukabi:
There will have to be SOOOOO many waivers to let Jared take that job. I could definitely see someone like Mattis saying aww hell naw at that appointment and bugging out.
p.a.
Dominic the Christmas Donkey makes me want to Anglicize my last name- google it, I dare you.
Christmas at KMart rocks.
JPL
@Yutsano: Like Melania, trump doesn’t really care.
opiejeanne
I like a lot of Michael Jackson’s music but there is an album of Christmas songs recorded by Michael when he was a kid that makes me want to cry it’s so awful and screechy. I have put back merchandise and walked out of stores because of that, and I’ve asked the clerks how they can stand to work in a building with that on loop. .
Mp
“Do They Know It’s Christmas” is awful. “Presents for Christmas” by Solomon Burke and “Christmas Time in Washington” by Steve Earle bound my Yuletide moods. Love ‘em both.
sukabi
@Yutsano: criminal investigation opened in to trumps inauguration fund…glad someone wants to know where all that money actually went.
RSA
@randy khan:
I’m sentimental, and a couple of tracks on that album are my favorite covers: The Pretenders, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, and U2, Baby Please Come Home.
opiejeanne
@Litlebritdifrnt: The Troika from the Lieutenant Kije suite is not Christmas music, but it sounds like Christmas music.
VOR
@Mike in NC: Santorum declined interest during an appearance on CNN, prior to even being approached by Trump.
laura
@pinacacci: THAT! It is so very awful, really awful, and in my last glamorous grocery store career. It played every 20 or 30 minutes, around the clock, no escape. Bad enough during the busy shopping day, but on the night crew….can’t, I just can’t.
laura
This, on the other hand, I love it so:
https://youtu.be/oiSf083QM_U
The whole album is delightful.
Ben Cisco
I don’t really listen to Christmas music anymore; I’ll probably get a few doses at my mom’s place. I do love Cyrus Chestnut’s “My Little Drum” – https://youtu.be/MYFfh_HWeS4
EBT
I listen to the Howard Phillip Lovecraft Historical Society’s holiday albums.
All I want for Christmas is my sanity
I saw mommy kissing Yog Shoggoth
Freddy the red brained Mi-Go
And all the other holiday classics we grew up with.
Librarian
I hate all Christmas music. Well, except for this: https://youtu.be/r9URPvejWHk
John Revolta
Ohhh fuck APOCALYPSO ALERT
Been nice knowin’ yez…………
The Midnight Lurker
Best Christmas music? Beethoven’s Ninth. See it live if ever you can. Your hairs will stand up during the choral movement.
Worst Christmas Music? Anything Muzak.
B Djojonegoro
I bow to the superior genius of Alexandra Petri:
A ranking of 100–yes, 100–Christmas songs
pat
I scrolled quickly through the responses, and didn’t notice anyone mentioning the DREADFUL arrangements played in every grocery store and drugstore, usually loudest in the produce section and near the photo section in Walgreen’s when one is attempting to organize a calendar at the kiosk without running screaming from the store.
I hate all music piped into stores (WHY do they have to do it) but Christmas is the absolute worst.
JPL
I worked in retail and all I can say is I wanted that f..king snowman to melt.
Gin & Tonic
@The Midnight Lurker: Please explain what is Christmas-y about it.
MoxieM
Well, the Phil Spector Xmas Album for both: love the music; person is obvs detestable.
Gotta go listen now…
Mr. Prosser
The aging soprano in the choir who, every year, sings a solo O Holy Night at the Christmas Eve service
FlyingToaster
Right now I’m having to deal with the fact that I’m a very bad parent, because WarriorGirl does not actually know the tunes to most XMas carols and is having to learn them — and not simple versions — on violin.
Her teacher starting singing “Deck the Halls” to her, and she was like, “huh?” They don’t learn them at her school.
I only know them because despite my old Jewish neighborhood, we had to sing them in the (public) school Christmas pageant every year. Even though I can’t fucking sing. In any language (thank you high school German).
I learned the tunes from playing them on (redacting the list of instruments because it’s fucking tedious). And I’m sure my parents suffered, since they had 4 of us, on 2-4 instruments apiece over the years, learning these.
xcentrikdb
Y’all are forgetting “Jingle Bell Rock”, the words to which appear to been composed via dartboard.
Steve in the ATL
@FlyingToaster: the child of a good parent knows “Christmas Rapping” by the Waitresses and “Christmas in Hollis” by Run-DMC, and prefers the Keith Richards cover of Chuck Berry’s “Run, Run Rudolph”.
No one cares about the baby boomer songs that have been overplayed for decade after decade.
Karen
I can’t stand “Grandma Got Runnover by a Reindeer. I hear it every year and I hate it.
I love “Christmas in Sarajevo” by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra.
And I love the soundtrack of “A Charlie Brown Christmas”
d504b
The worst xmas song by far is ‘the little drummer boy’ ! No mention of him in the christian bible and if there was a drummer in that stable- someone would have told him to stop it as it was disturbing the baby.
But there is one good/cool version on the Asleep At The Wheel’s “M erry Texas Christmas, Y’all’ about a “Swingin’ Drummer Boy”.
As another one who works in retail, one way to clear the ears is to listen to Graham Parker’s ‘Christmas is for mugs’ (on his Christmas Cracker disc), along with him & Nona Hendryx singing ‘Soul Christmas’.
One my my faves in xmas music is “A John Prine Christmas” who makes “I saw mommy kissing santa claus’ almost lewd. Such fun!
Amir Khalid
My favourite Christmas song is Stille Nacht — Silent Night, in the original Austrian.
agorabum
@Steve in the ATL: Also, the song that the beat from “Hollis” is taken from is also a great: Backdoor Santa by Clarence Clemons.
Amir Khalid
@John Revolta:
Keef is an old man now, and given his age it’s his vices that are leaving him …
Steve in the ATL
@agorabum: great point!
Also, the judges will accept “Fairytale Of New York” by Pogues with the effervescent Kirsty MacColl
wkwv
I’m commenting, so the thread must be dead. Twenty years ago, I worked for a notorious big box retailer, and from Thanksgiving until Christmas Day the ‘in store radio station’ played a three hour loop of Christmas songs. If your shift was from 3PM to 11PM- which meant until the asst. manager released you from aisle straightening duty at 2AM, you heard the same set of songs four times a day. I always disliked Little Drummer Boy, and got heartily sick of Jingle Bell Rock, but the one that drove me to almost tear my waist-length hair out was Winter Wonderland! Blasé Rat Pack crooners, Pop artists, even the Queen of Soul herself couldn’t make it sound genuine. Dolly Parton almost pulled it off (and other than Johnny Cash I wasn’t much for country) because she can sing giddily without being too out of character. Winter Wonderland played a small part in ending my four year retail career. I couldn’t face another Christmas at the cash register.
RAM
“Have a Holly, Jolly Christmas” by Burl Ives. Love Ives, but the downtown business owners’ played that thing over and over and over and over again and one of the speakers was right outside the newspaper office where I was trying to write news stores, a couple editorials, and my damned column every week and it nearly drove me to blow the damned speaker away with my trusty Brown Bess.
TomatoQueen
Mr Lehrer’s offering: https://youtu.be/DtZR3lJobjw
Death Panel Truck
@pinacacci: I heartily concur. I’m not wild about “Happy Xmas (War is Over)” either.
The Kinks’ “Father Christmas”, on the other hand…
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=l-oVPVsCqs4
jackmac
‘Little Drummer Boy’ is the worst, worst, worst. But Andy Williams’ “The Most Wonderful Time of the Year’ is giving the little drummer brat a run for his money.
Lot’s of contenders for best. When not overplayed, Leroy Anderson’s ‘A Christmas Festival’ is a favorite. It’s a nice combination of secular and religious. But I’m biased since both of my kids performed it with their choruses at high school holiday concerts, an event which always nicely captured the holiday spirit.
Salty Sam
My first wife passed away 4 days before Christmas in 1999- two days before she passed, with the knowledge that her passing was coming and inevitable, I spent the evening with my two young sons in a mall, “shopping” before I had to take them to a friend’s home to try to break the news of the the horrible reality that they were about to experience. It was like a bad acid trip, in that mall, with decorations and all that music. I remember hearing Andy Williams singing “It’s The Most Wonderful Time of the Year” while I was trying to compose in my head how I was going to tell my boys that their mom was going to be dead in a couple of days. I remember feeling like I was being turned inside out in front of the Food Court in the mall.
That was then and this is now. “It’s The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year” is my hands down favorite “bad” Christmas song.
Juju
O can’t stand “Little Drummer Boy”, and “Do you hear what I hear?”. Also on that list is that Manfred Steamroller crap. That’s enough to make me pull my hair out. Also “I want a Hippopotamus for Christmas” song. Bleh. I do like that Christmas bells thing.
FRANK MCCORMICK
This whole album is a joy…
https://www.amazon.com/Mozart-Wrote-Yourself-Little-Christmas/dp/B000003EWF
HeartlandLiberal
One of my favorite covers of this song is in German, sung by Matthias Reim, with band of women dressed in santa elf costumes a la Robert Plant Addicted to Love style. Not only do I like Matthias Reim’s German schlager / pop style, this take on the song is entirely amusing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qaM9TnjtY9A
Ol'Froth
The song I dread hearing this time of year is John Lennon’s “Merry Christmas/War is Over. The song itself is fine, but the screeching children “singing” at the end is just awful.