A Joyful Noise

Many years ago, my husband bought me one of those multi-disc CD players that hold 200 discs. I have a love/disenchanted relationship with it. I love having so much music of my choosing playing without commercials, but unless I take the time to put the CD covers in the book thing that came with it (which I've never done in over 15 years), I really don't know what I have loaded in there, or what's coming on next. Right now, I have about 40 of my Christmas CD's loaded in it so I'm listening to Christmas music non-stop.

Funny thing, Christmas music.

I can listen to Christmas music performed by just about anyone. I have the Kenny and Dolly CD, The Muppets, Vince Guaraldi, Narada, a few by Mannheim Steamroller, TSO, a few from Glenn Miller, The Nylons, and many, many compilation CD's. I have Mahalia Jackson (whose version of “Go Tell It On the Mountain” is my absolute favorite) and Patti LaBelle, Rosemary Clooney, Bing Crosby, Duke Ellington, Bruce Cockburn, Anne Murray, and more. Many more. Heck, I even have a Michael Bolton Christmas CD.

I am much less discerning about Christmas music than I am regular music. I guess it goes along with the whole “there's something about Christmastime” feeling.

There are songs that I adore and it doesn't matter who performs them. Then, there are specific versions of songs that I just love. There are lots of reasons why I might like a specific version of a song. For one thing, it just might be awesome (Like Mahalia Jackson singing “Go Tell It On the Mountain”), or it might be sentimental and nostalgic. Certain versions of certain songs were standard in my house while I was growing up. It wasn't Christmastime without Ray Conniff playing on the stereo. Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme singing “Let It Snow” will be forever ingrained as the crowned champion version of that song to me.

Barbra Streisand sings my favorite performance of “Jingle Bells”. It's on an obscure compilation disc I picked up in a grocery store while we were living in Chicago (though I'm pretty sure it was on her Christmas album originally). You either love it or you hate it, there's no middle ground with this one. I'm not really sure why I like it so much, it's a really strange arrangement, but I think it works.

“Little Drummer Boy/Peace on Earth” by David Bowie and Bing Crosby was originally performed on a televised Bing Crosby Christmas special. Let that sink in for a second...David Bowie was a guest on Bing Crosby's Christmas special. My dad really loved that version of that song; I remember watching that special all those years ago. In the years before YouTube, I went crazy searching for that song. I finally found it on a compilation disc one year. The disc is called “The Edge of Christmas”, and aside from Bing and David, it also has the Cocteau Twins, The Payolas, The Ramones and The Waitresses to name a few.

When I was really little, my parents bought me a kids' Christmas album by some group I'd never heard of. Most of the songs were horrible on it. Even though there were some awful songs, there's one song from that album I sing every year to my kids. It's called "The Day Before the Night Before Christmas". Every year, I'd search the internet and YouTube for that song, and one year, there it was!

I could ramble on and on about music, and specifically Christmas music, but we both have stuff to do.

Tell me some of your favorites!