Okay, I’m sure this is a really stupid question. But for all you Southern Hemisphere Dopers, where Christmas comes in the summer time, do you have any seasonally appropriate Christmas songs? After all, Let it Snow, White Christmas, Jingle Bells, and Winter Wonderland don’t really work in Australia and New Zealand and such.
Well, they don’t work so hot in most of the US, either - once you take out the deserts and the South, even most regularly snowy places don’t usually get a white Christmas, right?
There are quite a few Australian ones that are popular, many by the composer William James. We give some of them a run each year at midnight mass:
- The Three Drovers (one of my favourites)
- Carol of the Birds
- Christmas Day
- Christmas Bush for his Adorning
- The Silver Stars are in the Sky
Here’s a link to a CD including many of them.
The specifically snowy/winter ones occasionally get heard too, usually on cheesy American recordings played in shops.
Waltzing Matilda Roasting on an Open Fire?
d&r
Pukeko in a Ponga Tree gets a fair bash around here.
So does this.
The links can also link to other carols, but these are the two we sing. Otherwise, eh, xmas is a time of elves, magic and unseasonal singing about snow.
The only Australian carol I’ve heard with any regularity (other than myself) is Six White Boomers by Rolf Harris.
It would be cool for a change to hear songs like:
*I’m Dreaming of a Breezy Christmas
Surfin’ Santa
Summer Wonderland
Holy Beach
*
I was forced to sing Te Harinui in primary school, and I’ve heard it a few times elsewhere too. As far as I can recall, it’s the only “serious” NZ-oriented Christmas carol I’ve ever heard.
I quite like these guys:
http://www.gumtreemusic.com.au/music/colin-buchanan-and-greg-champion/aussie-christmas-with-bucko-and-champs-1-and-2.aspx
I particularly like “Good old Wally King” and “Christmas bush” as they have a traditional carol feel but with Australian imagery.
I was in Malaysia last weekend and all the malls had the traditional Xmas songs playing, this in a majority Muslim country with nary a snow flake in sight.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard that one.
Where’s the love for the Aussie* “Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer”*?
Costa Rica isn’t in the Southern hemisphere, but snow is something they’ve only seen in movies. Spanish carols tend to mention snow less than English ones: still, there were reindeers and snow-decorated Nativities all over the place (in Puebla (Mexico) and Miami as well).
We play them all here and enjoy them.
All the Xmas traditions are still celebrated even though it is summer.
I am surprised that Hawaiian one does not get played more often…
Mele Kalikimaka
You’re right, but the season is still winter. I mean, this week it got down to 62 degrees in Orlando(ish)! :eek:
The point of* White Christmas *is that the singer is someplace that doesn’t get snow. He’s dreaming of a *White Christmas. *
The sun is shining, the grass is green
The orange and palm trees sway
There’s never been such a day
In Beverly Hills, LA
But it’s December the 24th
And I’m longing to be up north
I’m dreaming of a white Christmas . . .
Yes. This point is lost on most people, since the intro is usually left out.
There’s also *The Reindeer Hula, *which my chorus has performed (with dance), but I can’t find a video.
Pukeko in a Ponga Tree is the only 1 I know.
Yeah, but he “used to know” white Christmasses. Most people have never seen such a thing. I’d probably pee myself if I saw one - we’d have to wait it out bunkered in with the last can of Spam and hope to God we got enough warning to go out and buy bread and milk. (That’s what we buy when it’s about to snow. I don’t know why either.)