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Best Version of “White Christmas” December 16, 2022

Posted by intellectualgridiron in Pop Culture.
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Let’s play a game.  It’s [loosely] called “name the best version of (fill-in-the-blank Christmas song)”.  After all, there are but so many Christmas songs out there, some 200 years old (or older), some 150+ years old, some 80+ years old, some 65-ish, some more recent than that.  The point is, myriads of recording artists have cut their own versions of many of these songs for almost 125 years.  What makes things interesting is that each singer/group/ensemble has had their own “take” on them.  So, whose “take” is the best?  Let us explore that answer.

Why not start with Irving Berlin’s venerable “White Christmas”?  Yes, the man who wrote an estimated 1,500 songs over the course of his 101 years on this Earth, including “God Bless America” and many legendary songs from the Golden Age of the Great American Song Book (“Cheek to Cheek”, “Blue Skies”, “Puttin’ on the Ritz”, “Easter Parade”, “Alexander’s Ragtime Band”, to name but a few) also gave us “White Christmas”.  It is altogether fitting and proper to take a look at this sing, since this year marks the 80th anniversary of its official release to the world.

The context behind the origins of “White Christmas” are multi-layered.  Just as Margaret Mitchell’s Civil War-era novel “Gone With The Wind” was a smashing success during the Great Depression, so was “White Christmas” at the dawn of America’s direct involvement in WWII.  While accounts vary as to exactly when Berlin actually wrote the song (within the years 1940 or ’41), it has been established that the first public performance of the song was indeed by Bing Crosby on his NBC radio show The Kraft Music hall, on Christmas Day of 1941, only 18 days after Pearl Harbor and 17 days after FDR asked Congress to declare war on Japan.

The song made a larger debut on-screen the following year in 1942 when it was featured in the now-classic movie “Holiday Inn”.  Crosby not only sang the song in the film, but also, as was customary at the time, recorded a studio version of the song on the Decca label as part of an accompanying album of songs from the movie.  He was accompanied by the Ken Darby Singers and the John Scott Trotter Orchestra when they made this recording on May 29, 1942.  It took them only 18 minutes to produce a rendition that satisfied everyone.

While the popularity of the 1942 movie Holiday Inn did eventually help propel record sales (it did top the charts by end of October of ’42), a stronger social undercurrent helped make the song legendary.  With America having officially joined the fight against the Axis powers after Pearl Harbor, the population was mobilized onto a war footing at an unprecedented scale and pace.  Yes, America had been mobilized a generation earlier in the First World War, but this new mobilization made the Allied Expeditionary Forces of old, and the industry supporting it, pale in comparison.

Within months after the fateful events of early December of 1941, many an able-bodied American man would be enlisted into service and deployed to many a spot abroad, or at least, far from home, from the deserts of North Africa to the Aleutian Islands, to air bases in England, to naval flotillas patrolling the South Pacific, and many spots in between. 

The song thus spoke to them, and to their families at home, of simpler times, or deep nostalgia.  The right mix of melancholy and comforting images of home during the Holidays resonated deeply with listeners during WWII, and the Armed Forces Network was flooded with requests to play this song during that time.

In its first year of recording and release, Bing Crosby’s first version of this song stayed at the top of the charts for 11 weeks.  Sales carried well into early 1943, and Decca re-released the song for Christmas seasons of 1945 and ’46.  For Holiday Inn, the song won the Academy Award for Best Original Song of 1942.

Ironically, the version with which most of us are familiar is Crosby’s re-recording of the song in 1947, also accompanied by both the Trotter Orchestra and the Darby Singers.  The addition of the flutes and a slightly more pronounced celesta helps make it audibly different from the first version without being too overtly different.

Readers may or may not be aware that Crosby’s 1942 and ’47 renditions combined add up to the greatest-selling record of all time:  more so than any record by Elvis, The Beatles, Michael Jackson, Elton John, or anybody.  By 1968, sales had reached 30 Million alone.  After much research, the Guinness Book of World Records concluded in 2007 that the record had sold at least 50 Million copies, though some estimates reach as high as 100 Million.

Twelve years after the song’s and the hit flick Holiday Inn’s initial release, Paramount was finally able to make a follow-up film for both, simply calling it “White Christmas”. It proceeded to become the most successful movie of 1954. While not as strong a film as its 1942 predecessor, it nevertheless has earned its place as a Christmas classic movie in its own right. That it was filmed in then-cutting-edge “VistaVision” has helped it translate well onto HDTV screens today. Naturally, the finale number was the movie’s namesake.

To broaden the scope:  in the 80 years since it was first recorded, “White Christmas” has been cut more than 500 times, making it the most-recorded Christmas song.  As mentioned in the beginning, many artists have offered their own “take” on it. For example, while Clyde McPhatter & The Drifters’ version [also] from 1954 is always a fun listen, it still is not has great as Bing’s original version.

That said, a solid runner-up is Darlene Love’s rendition on the also-classic album, Phil Spector’s “A Christmas Gift For You” from 1963.  As the first track of this perennially strong album, Love’s rendition packs much more of a virtual “punch” than people usually expect from the song, aided in part by Spector’s “Wall of Sound” audio effect, but also by the singer’s soulful efforts. Also notable of this version is that it includes the prelude verse that many other artists skip singing.

The real question is, which is really better, Bing’s 1942 version, or the 1947 remake?  Most folks would likely side with the latter, since that is the one with which they are familiar.  One cannot blame them, for that version is wonderful and timeless.  My vote is for the 1942 version:  the one that started it all.  It has a sharpness that the remake lacks, and the historian in me reflects on how it spoke to people’s hopes, fears, and comforts as we were beginning to take on a worldwide menace on an unprecedented scale.

The lasting legacy of Crosby’s 1942 version is grander than one might expect.  Its success on the charts legitimized the market for Christmas music.  To be sure, more than a few excellent versions of Christmas songs were recorded before this landmark cut, including notable examples by Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey, and Glenn Miller.  But Crosby, paired with Berlin’s incredible contribution to the Great American Christmas Songbook, finally opened the recording industry’s eyes to the potential goldmine they were sitting on with regard to recording music for the Christmas season.  In short, Crosby and Berlin, with White Christmas, paved the way for the bulk of popular Christmas music we have to enjoy today.

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Revisiting “A Jolly Christmas With Frank Sinatra” December 12, 2022

Posted by intellectualgridiron in Pop Culture.
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Five score and seven years ago today, the greatest pop singer of the 20th Century was born.  Francis Albert Sinatra would go on to have a recording career that would span almost six decades, and cut iconic records from at least five of them (more on that some other time).

Moreover, this anniversary of his birth makes things all the more fitting and proper that we should revisit his unforgettable Christmas album, “A Jolly Christmas with Frank Sinatra”, recorded and released 65 years ago in 1957.

In a previous article, I already made the case why this is one of the three greatest Christmas albums of all time.  Now it is time to go deeper still, and look at two very iconic recordings within this album.  A number of factors can make a record “iconic”.  One very key factor in this case is that Sinatra introduced two new songs that are now part of the great American Christmas Songbook.

The first of which is “Mistletoe and Holly” (track 3 of the album).  Even today, listeners of all ages can instantly recognize this classic recording, what with its distinct intro of the harmonious plucking of the violin strings, paired with mild percussion for a distinctly staccato effect.  But when one pays attention to the lyrics, one can also discern the song’s staying power:  it lists many cherished traditions with which most of us associate Christmastime in America.  “Tasty pheasants” (a fancy variation on the venerable Christmas turkey); Christmas presents; “countrysides covered with snow”; Kris Kringle; Grandma’s pies (speaking to family cooking/baking traditions); over-eating (who has not indulged a bit rich foods over the Holidays?); “[M]erry greeting from relatives you don’t know” (rather self-explanatory); “carols by starlight”; decorating one’s Christmas tree; “folks stealing a kiss or two” (who among us has not heard of spates of marriage proposals around Christmas?).

No doubt that everyone sensed this track would be a hit, which is likely a major factor in its featuring in Sinatra’s famous Christmas special with Bing Crosby that same year.

Meanwhile, “The Christmas Waltz” has its own backstory.  This now-iconic song was written by the dynamic duo of Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne in 1954, at Sinatra’s behest.  Nine years earlier (1945), this same duo gave to American culture “Let It Snow! Let It Snow” Let It Snow!”, first recorded by the great Vaughn “Foghorn” Monroe on RCA Victor that same year.  In 1954, Sinatra wanted a new Christmas song to pair on a single with his new version of “White Christmas”.  At first, Cahn balked at the request, but Styne was persuasively emphatic, knowing how dogged Sinatra was in turn.  While the two were working on the song together, inspiration hit them that nobody had written a “Christmas waltz” before.  Stine had a waltz melody he had previously put together, allowing the framework for Cahn to get to work on a fitting set of lyrics to match.  Sinatra would record this first version of “The Christmas Waltz” in August of that year, arranged by the great Nelson Riddle.

For the timeless 1957 album, though, Gordon Jenkins took the reins for both arranging and conducting.  “The Christmas Waltz” (track 5 of the album in question) was modified accordingly, and admittedly for the better.  This 1957 arrangement gives Sinatra more freedom to express his “honesty” in his lyrics, and the recording overall provides the perfect combination of nostalgia, fun, and just a drop of poignance to set everything off immaculately, in the same way that a pinch of salt in baked goods makes them paradoxically sweeter still.  The lyrics themselves are a paean to Christmas nostalgia (they seriously have us as “Frosted window panes…”). As an aside, the music effect of the violins right before Sinatra opens with the first lyrics provide a source of never-ending fascination.  Listen in a certain way, and they violin strings are played in such a way that some of the notes sound as if they were played on a pipe organ instead.  These notes are strengthened further by the ambient undertones of the harp.  Upon further review, how could this album not be considered Jenkins’ magnum opus of arrangement?

They say that imitation is the highest form of flattery.  Thus, the many cover versions of this song speak volumes to its timelessness and popularity.  Over the years, starting with Peggy Lee in 1960, the song has also been covered by notable artists such as Doris Day, Jack Jones (who also covered “Mistletoe and Holly” the same year, 1964), Bing Crosby, Pat Boone, Robert Goulet, The Osmonds, the Carpenters, Johnny Mathis, Andy Williams, Kathie Lee Gifford, Anita O’Day, Margaret Whiting, Rosemary Clooney, Don McLean, Natalie Cole, Helen Reddy, Barry Manilow, Clay Aiken, Kristin Chenoweth, Harry Connick Jr., even John Travolta. But none have come close to Sinatra’s original rendition.

To be sure, and interestingly, Mel Torme’s version from 1992 is unique in that Sammy Cahn wrote a new full set of additional lyrics as a personal gift to the singer.

A few interesting bits of trivia tie both of these great tracks from this legendary album together.  They were both issued as the A and B side of the same 45 RPM single together (Capitol F3900) at the same time that the album itself was released.  Both tracks also feature vocal backing by the Ralph Brewster Singers, who just so happened to include a bass singer by the name of Thurl Ravenscroft.  Nine years later, Ravenscroft would make his own notable contribution to the American Christmas Songbook by singing “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch” for the 1966 MGM animated adaption of Dr. Seuss’ own iconic Christmas curmudgeon.  The reader might also recall him as the voice of Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes’ Tony the Tiger for more than 50 years, but that is neither here nor there.

All that aside, these two songs, along with others in the album (how can one not love his oh-so catchy version of “Jingle Bells“?) more than merit “go-to” status for a jolly Christmas indeed, from the time of its initial release to 65 years later, or any Christmastime thereafter.