One of my favorite mileposts on the road to Christmas each year is Christmas music aficionado Andy Cirzan's annual appearance on WBEZ's Sound Opinions radio program and the simultaneous release of his latest holiday compilation. You see, Andy is truly the "Godfather" of most serious holiday music collectors. He's been putting together his annual complations since the 1980s, and he's been doing his annual gig on Sound Opinions for close to 20 years now.
By day, Cirzan's a vice president of Jam Productions, a successful concert promotion business. On his own time, however, he likes nothing better than searching used records stores, garage sales and similar haunts for crazy, offbeat and previously unknown holiday tunes. “Ninety-nine percent of the stuff on my CD, there’s zero chance anyone can stumble upon it on their own,” Cirzan explains. “I’m the archaeologist digging away and saying, ‘I can’t wait until people hear this.’ ” Andy's latest mix is called "Warblings from the Enchanted Forest," and it's another winner. I don't know how he does it, but 12 of the 13 tracks on this effort are tracks I've never heard before, which is a real treat. It's a good mix of styles and tempos, with a little something for everyone. Jazz fans will be especially interested in the last couple of track, by Dexter Gordon and the Dexter Gordon Quartet. Me? I'm rather partial to the first track on the second side of the album, "The Year Around Christmas," a classic 1970s EP featuring a bunch of hip cats groovin' on how to extend the holiday spirit throughout the year. The challenge, they concluded, was to convince people that "peace and love won't hurt anyone." You dig? I wish I knew about this track when I put together my special "The Now Sound of Christmas" mix a few years ago. You can download "Warblings from the Enchanted Forest" for free from Sound Opinions by clicking below, but act fast! The link comes down as this old year ends on December 31. Download Cirzan's latest holiday compilation, "Warblings from the Enchanted Forest" Now through 12/31/16 ONLY! Listen to Andy's Latest Appearance on Sound Opinions
Here is some background and other thoughts on the next little batch of songs from my latest annual mix of holiday audio treats:
Track 20 Donald Trump Loves Christmas, by Donald Trump (2015)
This may be small potatoes compared to the lengthening list of miserable appointments and horrifying decisions President-Elect Trump has made since Election Day, but I'm still deeply troubled by his willingness to not only jump aboard the preposterous "war on Christmas" bandwagon, but to urge it on to ever-increasing speeds and levels of dishonesty.
Lord knows I have no objection to a presidential candidate discussing a genuine love of Christmas, and I'm sure that the President-elect and his family truly love the holiday, just as he claimed at the Values Voters Summit in the September 2015 speech from which this track was excerpted. But to suggest that he can somehow require businesses to use the phrase "Merry Christmas" is preposterous. There's no question but that over the years there's been an increase in the use of more generic greetings such as "Happy Holidays," but that's driven primarily by the judgments of individual businesses that choose to appeal to a wider audience of customers. Interestingly enough, Trump's own business uses generic greetings, as does Trump himself in tweets and similar social media communications.
Talk of the so-called "War on Christmas" highlights both the fundamental dishonesty of this country's right wing and the President-elect's willingness to pander to its least intelligent members. To hear the right-wingers and Fox News tell it, President Obama and his rad-lib socialist baby-killers have all but criminalized the use of the phrase "Merry Christmas." One Fox News commentator recently claimed that neither the President nor the First Lady has so much as uttered the miserable word "Christmas" since they first entered the White House eight years ago, a claim that's soundly debunked by the following video compilation:
Sure, lots of commercial enterprises favor "Happy Holidays" over "Merry Christmas" these days, including the Trump Organization itself. That's because our country is becoming increasingly diverse, and it makes good business sense to be inclusive rather than exclusive. Neither President Obama nor the Democratic Party gives a damn how you address your holiday guests or holiday cards, and to suggest they're trying to destroy Christmas is just a bunch of malarky.
Track 19 To Heck with Old Santa Claus, by Loretta Lynn (1966)
Loretta Lynn
Loretta Lynn is among the most popular country music recording artists of all time. She recorded her first hit, "I'm a Honky Tonk Girl," in 1960, and since then 11 of her songs have hit #1 on Billboard Magazine's weekly country music charts. In 1980, the Academy Award-winning biographical film about her life titled "Coal Miner's Daughter" became one of the top films of the year and the Academy of Country Music named her "artist of the decade" based on her work in the 1970s.
"To Heck with Ole Santa Claus" was written and recorded by Lynn for her first Christmas album, "Country Christmas," which was released in 1966. It also appears on "20th Century Masters, The Christmas Collection: The Best of Loretta Lynn," and her latest album, "White Christmas Blue," which was just released this past October.
Track 18 Christmas in the Country Promo, by Johnny Dollar (1968)
This little gem was one of four promotional tracks released on a single record in 1968 titled "A Special Christmas Card." Each of the four tracks featured a different country recording artist droning on about the wonders of country music over the same dreary musical bed. What exactly did the four artists have in common? They all shared the same manager, Dick Heard, who was also the founder and president of the Royal American record label. All four tracks were posted on WFMU's late lamented "Beware of the Blog," which served up a slew of sensational off-the-wall tracks over its 10-year run. The blog was shuttered in July of 2015, primarily due to a lack of volunteer contributors, and, I'm guessing, a dwindling supply of postable material. After all, there's only so many bizarre clips, cuts and stories out there, and "Beware of the Blog" coughed up more treasures than you can believe. Happily, its rich archives are still available for your perusal at the same old address. Do yourself a favor and check it out.
Track 17 Sleigh Bells, Reindeer, and Snow, by Rita Faye Wilson (1955)
This is Ms. Wilson's second appearance on one of my holiday mixes. Two years before she recorded this song, back when she was known as "Little Rita Faye," Wilson recorded another Christmas tune in that same full-throated voice that makes this track such a treat. I included that earlier track, "I Fell Out of a Christmas Tree," on my 2010 mix, "Winter Wonderland" — in fact, it's one of my favorite tracks on the mix. Each of these Christmas tracks faded from public consciousness shortly after their initial release, but that didn't stop this plucky young woman, who continued to record for the next several years. Ironically, she achieved her greatest popularity when this track was included on a John Waters compilation of odd tunes and crank numbers several years ago. I've featured a number of tracks off the Waters collection on my various mixes, mostly as a joke. But this one's no joke. Her voice is strong and memorable, and she seems to have gained a certain maturity since her 1953 release. Give it a listen and see what you think.
Tonight's posting is coming to you from Houston, Texas, where it already feels like Christmas — or at least the North Pole. I mean, it's COLD down here tonight, with temperatures around 30 degrees and a cold, moist wind that cuts to the bone. It's a good night for staying indoors and catching up on stuff. Time to continue with our look at some of the tracks on Let It Snow!, my latest holiday mix for December 2016:
Track 16 A Swingin' Little Christmas Time, by Jane Lynch (2016)
Tim Davis, Jane Lynch and Kate Flannery
I first became aware of Jane Lynch the same way an awful lot of others did, I'm guessing — from her role as Christy Cummings, the uptight lesbian dog trainer in Christopher Guest's wonderfully funny 2000 feature Best in Show. Since that gig, Lynch has been working pretty steadily in both film and television. In 2009 she was cast as Sue Sylvester in the hit TV series, Glee, for which she earned an Emmy in 2010 as best supporting actress. What I didn't know until recently, however, is that Lynch is also a singer — and a damned good one, too. Several weeks ago, she released her first holiday album, "A Swingin' Little Christmas," which, of course, is where you'll find the tune "A Swingin' Little Christmas Time." Accompanying Lynch on the album is the Tony Guerrero Quintet; Tim Davis, the vocal producer from Glee; and Kate Flannery, best known for playing Meredith, everyone's favorite inebriate on NBC's "The Office." How did this project get going? According to Lynch,
we’ve been touring with the Tony
Guerrero Quintet doing a show called “See Jane Sing.” We’ve been this kind of
traveling group for the last year and a half or so. Around April, we said, “Why
don’t we do a Christmas album?” We were going to do it on our own nickel, so we
looked to see which songs are free and in the public domain. There’s some
beautiful classic stuff, so we picked 10 of those and Tony wrote five (new
songs), and you have our album!
The album has a little of everything — fun and frolicking in places, sentimental and wondrous in others. In short, it's just the ticket to put you in a holiday mood. And if you want an even surer mood elevator and plan to be in the Los Angeles area next Wednesday, December 21, Lynch and her fellow travelers will be performing in the wonderful performance space at Largo at the Coronet. Now, that looks to be a fun evening! Hope to see you there.
Track 14 Holiday Greetings from the Cast of Mama's Family (1986)
The Cast of Mama's Family Celebrate the Holidays
This isn't so much a track as a little snippet of what passed as dialogue on the popular syndicated comedy "Mama's Family." The show started as a regular sketch on the wonderful Carol Burnett Show, and it featured Vicki Lawrence as the demanding and outspoken Thelma Harper, a/k/a Mama. NBC picked up the show as a January replacement series in 1983, but the network never found the right slot for the program, and it was canceled half-way through its second year of production. The network continued to air reruns during the summer of 1984, however, and it attracted enough viewers to continue in syndication for several years, where it did reasonably well.
Track 13 Kissin' by the Mistletoe, by Dora Hall (1964)
Solo Cozy Cups
I don't imagine many of you remember much about entertainer Dora Hall, am I right? In fact, I'll go a step further and guess that you've probably never heard of her at all. But her story is a uniquely American tale that has always fascinated me, for thanks to her husband's position as president of the Solo Cup Company, this sweet little grandmother hustled and clawed her way through that acid-tinged psychedelic haze of 1970s Hollywood to become the genuine Queen of the vanity recording industry.
Ms. Hall first started, er, ah . . . um "entertaining" people in the 1920s and '30s as a fledgling singer and/or dancer, but she was a woman of modest talents and she enjoyed little success. By the late 1930s, she'd been pretty much filed and forgotten, so that, it seemed was that. Shortly afterward, she met Leo J. Hulseman, the founder and president of the Solo Cup Company. The two fell in love, married and raised a family, and Mr. Husleman managed to build the Solo Cup Company into an economic powerhouse. Well, that may be a bit of an overstatement, but he sure did well for himself, and so, eventually, did his lovely bride. Once their children had left the nest, Mrs. Leo J. Husleman, who adopted the stage name Dora Hall, decided the time was right to make it big on the stage, screen and airwaves with the help of her husband's wealth and prominent business position.
The first step involved Dora's musical talent. She recorded a series of musical numbers that Solo began to give away with every purchase of Solo Cups. I remember my aunt used to buy Solo Cozy Cups when our families made our annual summer vacation trip to Casco Bay, Maine. Somewhere I still have the back of a package of cups on which Dora's rise to stardom was dutifully described. By the 1970s, the Huslemans had branched out into TV. The couple put together several TV specials featuring Dora and a series of second-rate entertainers such as impressionist Rich Little, singers Donovan and Frank Sinatra, Jr., and alleged comedian Phil Harris.
"Kissin' by the Mistletoe" is one of several Dora Hall holiday records. Several of her other contributions to our cultural history appear below. Amazing, right? And uniquely American, to be sure.
As a history buff and avid reader about all things presidential, I'm always interested in seeing the White House Christmas card each year. Well, President Obama and his family released their 2016 holiday card last week, and naturally it's become the subject of a lot of discussion. Why? Because it features a family picture rather than a more general depiction of the White House in winter.
It is believed that President Calvin Coolidge was the first president to commission a holiday card back in 1927. Since then, there's been an official White House card every year. The styles vary widely, of course depending on a host of factors. Interestingly enough, the Obamas are on the third presidential family to feature a picture of themselves on the card. President and Mrs. Franklin Roosevelt featured family pictures at least half a dozen times. Oddly enough, while the Roosevelts typically signed their cards as "The President and Mrs. Roosevelt," there were two years (1936 and 1941) in which the White House card came from "Mrs. Franklin Delano Roosevelt," with no mention of the President at all.
The only other White House card to feature a picture of the current occupants was the first card sent by President and Mrs. Hillary Clinton in 1993. Truth be told, it wasn't a particularly good picture of the Clintons, although it certainly looked better than any of the grim portraits of the Roosevelts. But it can't hold a candle to the photograph on this year's card, which captures the class, grace and poise the current First Family brought to the White House.
This year's card includes the following message:
"As our family reflects on our many happy years spent in the White House, we are grateful for the friends we've made, the joy we've shared, and the gifts of kindness we've received.
"We wish you and your loved ones a joyous holiday season and a wonderful new year."
I've got a feeling that the new year's going to become mighty horrifying real quick beginning on Inauguration Day.
