a Swinging Christmas

Scooping up tracks from Royant’s seasonal singles and marrying them to newly recorded cuts, Wishing You a Merry Christmas is cool, hip and opens with a swinging cover of “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” drawn from Phil Spector’s 1963 A Christmas Gift for You from Philles Records album. After this, the self-composed (“C'mon Baby) It's Christmas Time!” sets the tone for a ten-tracker which swims in less-obvious waters, even when a song is over familiar.

A Capitol Christmas Volume Two is part of the on-going celebration of Capitol 75 & includes key tracks by Glen Campbell, Dinah Shore & The Beach Boys singing Christmas classics. Bing's huge hit, "Do You Hear What I Hear?"; Frank singing "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas;" Ella giving what I consider the very best performance ever of "The First Noel;" Nat King Cole's classic "The Christmas Song;" and Capitol founder Johnny Mercer and the Pied Pipers swinging "Santa Claus is Coming To Town". And they've also included "The Christmas Spell" by Peggy Lee, "I'd Like You For Christmas" by Julie London, and "The Merriest" by June Christy that aren't as well known but fit right in and add some desirable variety to the mix.

Like the Dickens classic itself, Alan Barnes's 'Christmas Carol' has something for everyone: a treat for the jazz connoisseur; it will delight anyone who loves music or literature - or just Christmas!

Grammy Award-winning singer and Oscar-nominated actress Mary J. Blige is celebrating the 10th anniversary of her holiday album, A Mary Christmas. Produced by the incomparable David Foster and featuring duets with artists such as Barbara Streisand, Chris Botti, The Clark Sisters, Jesse J and Marc Anthony, this special anniversary edition includes 2 previously unreleased tracks.

“Jingle Sells” by Swinging Santas is out on January 3rd which is a bit late for a Christmas album :) A young jazz quartet, ribbon microphones and a living room for your politically incorrect Holiday Record of the year Being late is never nice, of course. Not to mention being late at Christmas dinner. This could be the case for this album, born in a reckless way.

Born in Massachusetts and raised in Canada, Robert Goulet was a gifted singer and actor who became an overnight star in 1959 when he was cast as Sir Lancelot in the original stage production of Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe's musical Camelot. Goulet was a popular attraction on stage and screen for decades, and in 1961 he signed a recording contract with Columbia Records, releasing more than 20 albums with the label. Goulet's rich, powerful, but pleasing voice was a good match for Christmas-themed material, and Goulet recorded two Yuletide albums for Columbia, "This Christmas I Spend with You" in 1963 and "Robert Goulet's Wonderful World of Christmas" in 1968. The Complete Columbia Christmas Recordings reissues these two albums on a single CD, as well as including five bonus songs - two that appeared on a rare benefit single, and three compilation tracks that find Goulet duetting with his then-wife Carol Lawrence.

Christmas has provided a rich seam of subject matter for songwriters to mine over the years, building on a significant repertoire of carols and other religious songs in the traditional arena, and an ever-growing catalogue of secular songs for people to enjoy during a season when music has always been an essential element of the festivities. In the era of the commercial record sales charts, the competition for that elusive Christmas No. 1 hit has often been intense, and some notable seasonal hits have been major sellers over the years.

A rhetorical question: what makes a great Christmas album? We know all or most of the chestnuts, both commercial and religious. The Drummer Boy flams, someone's dreaming white, and another will be home in their dreams. The annual marathon Yuletide programs rely heavily on the tried and true with an occasional novelty thrown in. Classical purists hit up the legit pantheon. With this album, a capella vocal group, Accent adds a Who's Who of world-class arrangers (Jorge Calandrelli, Nan Schwartz, Elliot Deutsch and including group members James Rose and Simon Åkesson), celebrated musicians (including Arturo Sandoval), and takes the obligatory jazz Holiday album to an invitingly unique level the appeal of which is infectious.