Bing Crosby and "I'll Be Home for Christmas"

(This is the third part of my December series about my favorite Christmas songs.)

It would be impossible to discuss great Christmas songs without mentioning Bing Crosby, whose Spotify artist listing shows his top 10 songs as Christmas songs (with all of them used in the tens of millions).

I still remember the Bing Crosby Christmas album my Aunt Betty gave me decades ago (see the cover below), which was the perfect Christmas song album. I have never heard a better one. Crosby had that rich baritone voice which was made for Christmas songs.

Crosby's most popular song is White Christmas, which is beautiful in both its music and lyrics. But it was important not just for its imagery, but also its impact on World War II, when it was first released (1942).



But White Christmas is almost generic next to I'll Be Home for Christmas, which was released a year later (1943). Both songs hit on the traditional Christmas imagery, but I'll Be Home for Christmas adds an additional emotional sucker punch for troops away from home.



The lyrics start off simply enough, with the traditional Christmas imagery in the setup:

I'll be home for Christmas
You can plan on me
Please have snow and mistletoe
And presents on the tree
Christmas Eve will find me
Where the lovelight gleams

But then the song takes you away, forcing you to realize where the singer really is:

I'll be home for Christmas
If only in my dreams

In other words, that entire setup was only in the singer's imagination.

Can you imagine how powerful this was for both the soldiers in World War II, but also the people at home, imagining their loved ones off fighting a war? 

I'll Be Home for Christmas has been covered by more singers than I can list, with several notable being Perry Como, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, and Johnny Mathis. But Crosby's version remains the gold standard.

Because the emotional impact of this song is so much greater than most Christmas songs, this is why I consider this song my favorite Christmas song of all time.

Nat King Cole's "The Christmas Song"

(This is the second part of my December series about my favorite Christmas songs.)

No list of great Christmas songs would be complete without one by the greatest singer of all-time, Nat King Cole, who made his mark on Christmas with a simple song titled "The Christmas Song (Merry Christmas to You)":



The song was written in 1944 by Bob Wells and Mel Tormé, as a way to cool down during a hot summer. According to Tormé:

"I saw a spiral pad on his (Wells') piano with four lines written in pencil. They started, 'Chestnuts roasting..., Jack Frost nipping..., Yuletide carols..., Folks dressed up like Eskimos.' Bob didn't think he was writing a song lyric. He said he thought if he could immerse himself in winter he could cool off. Forty minutes later that song was written. I wrote all the music and some of the lyrics."

Cole first recorded the song in 1946, and again in 1953 and 1961. The 1961 version, shown above, is the most popular version.

While the song has been covered many times, and by many different kinds of artists, nobody has yet topped what Cole did with it. He was a master of being able to hit each note just perfectly, leaving little room for interpretation later.

On the bright side, he left us with this perfect little Christmas gem.

Elvis's "Blue Christmas"

This December, I am going to review my favorite Christmas tunes, starting with Elvis Presley's Blue Christmas.

(hat tip to Wikipedia for the pic)

Although the song itself is kind of simple and cheesy, it is a good example of what made Elvis unique among singers. Nobody can do this song in his style without sounding silly. But Elvis's unique sincerity shines through, allowing him to do songs everyone else should avoid.

A good example of the kind of failure lesser singers risk was shown by none other than Porky Pig in this silly cover:

Kudos to Martina McBride for figuring out the secret to Blue Christmas. It needs Elvis to make it work. Her 2008 virtual duet with him on it was as endearing as the original:

The Blue Christmas lyrics are amazingly simple:

I'll have a Blue Christmas without you
I'll be so blue just thinking about you
Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree
Won't be the same dear, if you're not here with me 

And when those blue snowflakes start falling
That's when those blue memories start calling
You'll be doin' all right, with your Christmas of white
But I'll have a blue, blue blue blue Christmas 

You'll be doin' all right, with your Christmas of white
But I'll have a blue, blue Christmas

The beauty of the lyrics lie in their clever use of colors to contrast different aspects. We have the "Blue Christmas" contrasting with the "Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree", as well as "blue snowflakes" and "blue memories" contrasting with the other person's "Christmas of white". In other words, one person sees blue in the snow while the other sees white.

Some people claim this song is about unrequited love, but I disagree. The line about "blue memories" indicates remembrances of a past Christmas (or many Christmases) with the person who is the object of affection.

Regardless of the song's intent, it is definitely not a song for people who get depressed during the holidays. Otherwise, it shares a virtue of most songs of the blues genre: We get contrarian joy from the sadness of others, by recognizing how good we have it compared to others. That may sound cruel, but isn't that also the basis for why people give prayers of thanks?