As you know, gentle reader, I have numerous Christmas albums acquired over decades (well, I inherited some eleven years ago and have added to the stash since) and I have a working record player this year. So am I listening to Christmas records 24/7? Unfortunately, no–as I am not spending much time in the kitchen/parlor/living room area where you can hear the records on the record player.
Instead, I have been listening to other, more limited, playlists of Christmas songs in other venues.
I started with the local Christmas radio station. This year, 106.7 The River (don’t ask me the call letters–radio stations rarely mention them any more, and you can’t spell “River” from any combination thereof) started very early–the beginning of November–to get a jump on 105.9 KGBX (all right, make a rule and suddenly there’s an exception). As a radio station, it focuses more on the secular songs of Christmas and the more recent poppy versions of them. It mixes in a little Perry Como and Bing Crosby, but not a lot. Since it was the first source of Christmas music at my disposal, I let the radio play a lot, and after a couple of nights of a couple of hours at dinner and thereafter, we got very familiar with the radio-sized playlist–which is to say, it’s not very big.
At night, in the recliner, I used my phone to play some of the albums I have in CD form streaming to a Bluetooth speaker. Unfortunately, my set of Christmas CDs is pretty limited: Erin Bode’s A Cold December Night; Alberti’s Merry Christmas; Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass Christmas Album; Jessy J’s California Christmas; Mannheim Steamroller’s Christmas, Christmas Extraordinaire, and Christmas in the Aire (as I mentioned); and Natalie Cole’s Holly and Ivy. I was starting to think of this as the “The Holly and the Ivy” Christmas as the song was over-represented in the CD streaming rotation (that is, Erin Bode and Natalie Cole sang it repeatedly).
At the end of November, I remixed our audio equipment here, which allowed me to spin records and stream the DirecTV more traditional Christmas station through the speakers downstairs.
Well, a couple nights of addressing Christmas cards made me very familiar with the satellite provider’s Christmas list which is almost as small but different than the radio’s.
For example, perhaps the person who programmed the playlist is a bigger fan of Robert Goulet than Fillyjonk, but you get multiple tracks every night, including “This Christmas I Spend With You”:
I mean, topically, it’s not that different from Natalie Cole’s “No More Blue Christmases”:
However, the Goulet song sure does have an “I’m God’s gift to you” vibe, ainna? As you might remember, gentle reader, I actually have that album, and we play it once every year just because we have it (kind of like the Mario Lanza Christmas album we have). I don’t actually think we made it through the whole album yet this year, but with the satellite television music playlist, we’ve probably listened to more Goulet Christmas music overall than ever before.
Another song in heavy rotation is “Up on the Housetop”. The satellite music playlist includes several versions, including the one by the Jackson 5:
So it’s not uncommon to hear the song several times a night. Which is more striking because I was not familiar with the song before this year, but I am now. My boys know it–the youngest sings along with it–but it’s not heavily represented on the records I own, and if you hear the Jackson 5 on a Christmas radio station, it’s probably “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus”. I know it because I’ve heard it a bunch.
The satellite radio station also plays selections from Ella Fitzgerald, but Santa Claus Got Stuck In My Chimney” is in such heavy rotation that we’re sick of it. And Allan Sherman’s “12 Days Of Christmas”, another song I was not familiar with. And the Spike Jones Orchestra renditions of “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” and “All I Want For Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth”. So novelty Christmas songs go way back, but you can have way too much of them.
Additionally, WSIE has worked some Christmas music into its playlist, which is kind of nice as the playlist has seemed to shrink quite a bit towards the end of the year–but it’s not that broad, either. Maybe when I drop them my annual contribution, they’ll be able to afford additional music.
So what have I done?
I have worked to switch between the Christmas music sources frequently enough to keep them fresh. As we’re only a couple days away from Christmas itself, I think I’ll make it without being driven crazy. Because although we will probably have the trees lit until New Years weekend, the Christmas music comes pretty much to a full stop on December 26 here at Nogglestead.
