a Swinging Christmas

Ella Wishes You a Swinging Christmas is a charming, warmly humorous – and yes, swinging – set of classic Christmas tunes. The program is familiar, from bouncy singalongs like "Jingle Bells" to slinky ballads like a downright sexy "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," but Fitzgerald treats each song with exactly as much respect as it deserves…

Ella Wishes You a Swinging Christmas is a charming, warmly humorous - and yes, swinging - set of classic Christmas tunes. The program is familiar, from bouncy singalongs like "Jingle Bells" to slinky ballads like a downright sexy "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," but Fitzgerald treats each song with exactly as much respect as it deserves. And so Frank Loesser's "What Are You Doing New Year's Eve" is wistfully romantic and Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne's "Let It Snow" is kittenishly enticing. As always, Norman Granz's production avoids the schlock that drowns some holiday sets. This is as good as jazz Christmas albums get.

The Jazz Club series is an attractive addition to the Verve catalogue. With it's modern design and popular choice of repertoire, the Jazz Club is not only opened for Jazz fans, but for everyone that loves good music.

For Canadian songstress Jill Barber, nothing signals the start of the holiday season like the needle dropping on her most cherished Christmas albums: the cozy familiarity of Bing Crosby’s smooth baritone on White Christmas, getting dolled up in holiday glam to the soundtrack of Ella’s A Swinging Christmas, the glimmer of hope you feel when Nat King Cole’s buttery voice sings “chestnuts roasting on an open fire,” or the childhood wonder you experience when The Muppets perform their playful rendition of "The Twelve Days of Christmas." It’s this feeling of lightness, hope and nostalgia that inspired her to create her first-ever collection of holiday songs, "A Holly Jolly Jill Barber Christmas".