As the holiday season approaches, my playlist consists of my favorite winter music to get you in the spirit! Here is a list of some of my top holiday-themed songs to listen to this season!
- “What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve?” By Ella Fitzgerald
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This lesser-known holiday standard tells the tale of a lonely narrator looking for a special someone to share a New Year’s kiss with.
The “Queen of Jazz,” Ella Fitzgerald, perfectly renders the song’s sweet lyrics, imbuing them with a blend of melancholy and hope.
- “Skating” By Vince Guaraldi Trio
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The score to A Charlie Brown Christmas is full of iconic jazz tunes, including “Christmas Time is Here,” “Linus and Lucy,” and “My Little Drum.” But “Skating” stands out as my favorite of the selection.
Vince Guaraldi Trio’s beautiful piano melody immediately conjures images of falling snow, while the soft percussion provides texture and movement.
- “The Christmas Waltz” By She & Him
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Did you know that Zooey Deschanel (a.k.a. Jessica Day from New Girl) is in a band? She & Him, Deschanel’s collaboration with guitarist M. Ward, has released two albums of classic Christmas covers.
“The Christmas Waltz,” popularized by Frank Sinatra, has a lilting, waltzing time signature that provides ideal fodder for Deschanel’s airy vocals.
- “Christmas Dreaming” By Laufey
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Another Christmas ballad originally recorded by Sinatra, Laufey’s cover of “Christmas Dreaming” was released only a few weeks ago.
Laufey has a voice made for the Great American Songbook, and this tune is no exception. It allows her to show off her gorgeous lower register.
- “White Christmas” By The Drifters
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Remember that scene from Home Alone when Kevin sings “White Christmas” with a comb microphone in the bathroom mirror? All apologies to the original, but I personally think that it’s the superior version of the Irving Berlin classic.
The Drifters’ barbershop arrangement is simply irresistibly energetic, contrasting the group’s deep bass singers with a dynamic falsetto solo.
- “If We Make It Through December” By Phoebe Bridgers
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Phoebe Bridgers is no stranger to taking a sad folk song about winter and making it her own, AKA even more depressing. See also “Day After Tomorrow,” written by Tom Waits, which features the eternally relatable lyric for finals season in the Northeast: “And it’s so hard, and it’s cold here.”
Bridgers’ hushed voice imbues “If We Make It Through December,” originally written by country legend Merle Haggard, with her unique sense of darkness and melancholy.
- “River” By Joni Mitchell
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This beautiful track from Joni Mitchell’s 1971 masterpiece Blue embodies the feeling of wanting to escape the holidays with a single iconic lyric: “I wish I had a river I could skate away on.”
“River” also features a somber piano accompaniment that creatively interpolates the melody of “Jingle Bells” and pairs perfectly with Mitchell’s sweeping soprano voice.
- “7 O’clock News/Silent Night” By Simon & Garfunkel
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Simon & Garfunkel’s 1966 sound collage juxtaposes the pair singing “Silent Night” in two-part harmony with a simulated recording of a 7 o’clock news segment, which gradually becomes louder over the course of the song.
The news segment details the major events of 1966, contrasting the harsh realities of the Vietnam War, racism, and murder with the pair’s angelic, peaceful singing. Phoebe Bridgers and Fiona Apple recently covered the song in 2019, including current events.
- “Christmas Wrapping” By The Waitresses
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For a change of mood, listen to “Christmas Wrapping” by new wave band The Waitresses, best known for their single “I Know What Boys Like.”
Instead of opting for a ubiquitous rose-colored depiction of the holiday season, “Christmas Wrapping” infuses irony and a realistic sense of Christmas exhaustion into an undeniably catchy single.
- “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” By Darlene Love
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I knew I had to close off this playlist with a classic, and “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” is just that. From the first toll of the song’s ever-present bells to the wall-of-sound string arrangement, no song embodies Christmas time more to me than this one.
Darlene Love’s exuberant belting is the special sauce that has allowed this song to live in our collective Christmas consciousness since its release in 1963. Whether you’re waiting for your special someone to “please come home” or not, you’ll be transported to a scene of a gleeful holiday reunion, à la Love Actually.
What have you been listening to this December?
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