A Wonderfully Musical Christmas Time

If you’ve been listening to 92.7 WOBM with any regularity lately you know we’ve been playing all Christmas music and will continue to do so for a few more days.

You may get tired of hearing the same songs time and time again or you may be like me and only feel that way about songs you don’t want to hear like “Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer,” “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus,” “Feliz Navidad,” “All I Want For Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth” and the incredibly depressing “Christmas Shoes.”

However, like most of you, I have my favorites. Songs I associate with Christmas, occasionally sing along with and just feel in the spirit when I hear them.

Of course many of these have been recorded by multiple artists and some versions are clearly better than others.  Here are some of my favorites in no particular order:

• “All I Want for Christmas is You”- Mariah Carey (although I like the way the young girl sings it in the movie Love Actually.
• “Wonderful Christmastime”- Paul McCartney
• “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”- Judy Garland
• “Peace on Earth/Little Drummer Boy”- Bing Crosby & David Bowie combine for one of the most unique pairings in music history.
• “Merry Christmas Baby”- There are several artist versions to choose from but I like the way both Bruce Springsteen & Otis Redding sing this one. My favorite Springsteen holiday song though is “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town.”
• “Sleigh Ride”- The Ronettes
• “Last Christmas”- Wham
• “Christmas Time is Here”- Vince Guaraldi Trio (you know this best from A Charlie Brown Christmas).
• “Happy Xmas (War Is Over)”- John Lennon
• “Christmas” (Baby Please Come Home) - Darlene Love (the irony of this song is it was released on the day President Kennedy was assassinated).

For those who think I forgot some of the more traditional favorites I did not.

Also on my list would be “The Christmas Song” by Nat King Cole, both “White Christmas” and “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” by Bing Crosby, “O Holy Night” which has been recorded by too many artists to mention and “Silent Night.”

The Bing Crosby version is the third best-selling single of all time but to me this song sounds best when sung by a church choir.