Favorite Christmas Carols

[DawnT]

What is your favorite Christmas song and/or your favorite Christmas song singer/group?

My favorite song is "Oh Holy Night", my favorite singer/group is the Oakridge Boys.

 

[Michelemarie]

Oh my, I have several - some because I like them and some because of the memories. "Frosty" is a favorite because my son sings along (he is 3), "Feliz Navidad" because its my dad's favorite, "Silver Bells" because it was my Grandpa's favorite - he passed away a long time ago but he was a hardy so for him to like a soft song was meaningful. I like "We Three Kings" and a few instrumentals that I don't know the name of.

 

[texasgirl]

I have several also. #1 would have to be, Brenda Lee- Rocking around the Christmas Tree, then there's Bing Crosby- White Christmas, Perry Como- It's beginning to look alot like Christmas, Eartha Kitt with Henri Rene orchestra- Santa Baby. Nat King Cole, Fats Domino etc....I love the oldies Christmas. And The Nutcracker.

 

[David Cottrell]

This Christmas I will be listening to acouple of my favorites in Ukrainian - had to go to Books by Volunteers who serve Ukraine Orphans to copy one of my links -
http://www.sparinsky.kiev.ua/rizdvo/titles_eng.htm My two favorites are Silent Night and Schedryk Generous Eve - with media player you can hear a bit of each.

I can't understand spoken Ukrainian, hardly know a handful of written words for that matter, but the language has a special melody "built in". It's known as Nightengale speach for a good reason.
I hope you enjoy.

 

[Bilby]

Traditional - Good King Wenceslas - any rendition but great with a Welsh Choir
Modern - Jingle Bell Rock - anyone who can sing
Film - All I want for Christmas is you - from Love Actually

 

[suziquzie]

Mariah Carey did a Christmas album about 10-15 years ago and I just love the entire thing!

These are horribly cheesy (and dated!)
But I forgot about Last Christmas by Wham!
or Do THey Know It's Christmas by Band-Aid

I must remove myself from the eighties station one day......

 

[licia]

There aren't many Christmas songs that I don't like (Grandma got run over by a reindeer, being one of them). One of my most favorite is "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas". It evokes so many memories, both sad and happy that are such a part of the holiday. As much as the fact that the celebration is about the birthday of our Savior, it always brings to mine the Christmases of the past when important family members were here to celebrate.

 

[DawnT]

David, Thank-you for sharing that site.. the sounds are beautiful' just as you said they would be!! The tears are now starting to dry. DawnT

 

[DawnT]

All of you have such wonderful choices of songs and memories to go alongs with them. I hope this will help get you jump-started into the wonderful holiday of Christmas!!
DawnT

 

[jabbur]

I really like The Cambridge Singers Christmas Star album. Hope this link works and you can listen to clips.
Christmas Star - Carols For The Christmas Season / Rutter Classical
They are a British choir and their director is also a composer. He has taken many traditional carols and made lovely arragements. My favorite is an a cappella version of Silent Night where there is only a 2-part harmony with the lower voices singing the accompaniment. It is truely beautiful.

 

[DawnT]

jabbur, That is a beautiful sounding arrangement. I might just have to order it!

 

[jabbur]

My church choir did many of these one Christmas and I really fell in love with the music. I have all the Christmas albums. They do a lot of the traditional stuff but the arrangements are just so full and beautiful that makes them better than usual in my opinion. They also do some other Christmas songs that are more obscure to Americans but beautiful all the same. Glad you liked what you heard! BTW, I enjoy Oak Ridge Boys as well! I think I have a very eclectic music taste (anything but hip-hop/rap).

 

[Davydd]

Go way back to the early 50s and the advent of TV. Fred Waring and his Pennsylvanians is what I most remember about Christmas music from my childhood. That and Gene Autry singing Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer on 78 rpm vinyl records.

Fred Waring and the Pennsylvanians

 

[NAchef]

Santa Baby - Madonna

 

[DawnT]

Davydd, Mom and Dad had "To You Forever". I used to listen to it when I would watch my little brothers and sister!!

 

[Callisto in NC]

12 Redneck Days of Christmas (Jeff Foxworthy)
Christmas with the Family (Montgomery Gentry)

 

[DawnT]

Isn't there a Canadian version of the Twelve days spoof? I like the mouse your cat caught Callisto. Mine always tries for the cursor.

 

[jabbur]

You certainly got me going today DawnT! After replying to this thread, I had to go a rip all my cd's and sync them to my mp3 player! I forgot I hadn't done that with y Christmas music. Now I can listen to it in the car on the way to class tonight!

 

[Katie H]

In 1970 when I was expecting my first child, I was especially touched by a Barbara Streisand song, "The Best Gift". It had special meaning to me because I'd been told I could never have children and was only able to get pregnant with my baby because of fertility therapy. Shawn was born December 5th, so he really, really was MY best gift. The song still brings tears to my eyes.

Love Kathy Mattea's rendition of "Mary, Did You Know?"

As for groups, I like Alabama. Especially their 1985 album called "Christmas." There's nothing more cheery and Christmassy as "Thistlehair the Christmas Bear" on that album.

 

[ChefJune]

I love Christmas music.

My favorite carol is really probably whatever one I'm singing at the time, tho there are some I like better than others:
Gesu Bambino
O Holy Night
Joy to the World
I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day (alternate tune)

For recorded holiday music, I love the whole Christmas album by Leontyne Price. She includes both Ave Maria's, and the Mozart Alleluia!
Luciano Pavarotti's and Mario Lanza's are big faves too, and best of all is an old lp of the Festival of Lights from the University of Redlands.

Contemporarily, of course Nat Cole's Christmas Song, and I love Diana Krall's version of "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas." Have you heard Joe Williams' "That Holiday Feeling?"