This is what I came in to post! I love this and I often at least think of it in the summer.
Most of it is a cliche, the hate for “All I want for Christmas is You” seems to be based upon a marketing meme campaign.
But some people had bad experiences with the Holiday as a kid, and cant get over it.
Others so virulently hate the Christian religion, that is almost becomes a religion for them.
Oddly not many “Christmas Songs” mention Jesus.
I know I mentioned this at least once- it has lots of Winter Imagery, and it is a happy song. About half or so of Christmas songs are really Winter songs- Jingle bells for example. Let it Snow, Winter Wonderland, Frosty The Snowman, Baby its Cold Outside, and so forth.
I like the song River by Joni Mitchell at this time of year.
Fits my melancholy quite well.
And the Sound of Music was broadcast near Christmas for many years.
I recently picked up a double CD set of Christmas Classics – a combination of the usual stuff and some really off-the-wall choices. Like
@Skywatcher
That is one heck of a strange tune ![]()
That’s what I was coming here to post. The Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack is one of the few Christmas albums I actually like.
I did a search on Spotify yesterday and found ‘100 Greatest Christmas Songs Ever’. I was expecting the classics in classic style, but there a quite a few artists that I had never heard of who had some great renditions.
I quite like that!
But then… Nick Lowe
I guess Christmas songs would be OK (-ish) if there was just a day of them (say). But for two weeks already you can’t go in a shop without hearing the same damn songs over and over again (reporting from the UK here).
But here’s one that’s been on my mind in a nice way.
The reason is: I’ve been looking through the paintings of Dante Gabriel Rossetti (who I’m slightly obsessed by) and starting to check out the rest of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and their hangers on. This song is a poem by Christina Rossetti, Dante Gabriel’s sister (a Pre-Raphaelite Sibling, as it were; music by Gustav Holst).
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“In the bleak midwinter” is in our hymnal. I’d say we sing it at least one service every year. Beautiful melody, lovely harmony, find the words very pedestrian and not up to the loveliness of the music. Your mileage may vary, of course!
I’m going to take back one of the things I said about the local Christmas station…there is one absolutely out of left field song they have in heavy rotation….Dan Fogelberg - Same Old Lang Syne
It takes place on Christmas Eve so… I guess?
That, and the song was released in November/December of 1980.
And he sings, “Snow was falling Christmas eve”.
Here’s some Christmas music by John Fahey. He was a guitarist who created a style of playing he called “American Primitive.” I’m going to split this into several posts to avoid the YouTube preview bug.
Jingle Bells
Nice guitar work.