Saturday, December 08, 2007
The scourage of Christmas music
I used to love Christmas music, but now I can barely tolerate it. Its ubiquity, particularly on the radio, bores me almost as much as it baffles me. Yes, I understand why malls, which are in the business of inducing impulsive spending, want to remind us that this is the "season of giving" at every opportunity. That does not, however, explain why commercial radio flogs us with bad pop holiday music from Thanksgiving forward. Since corporate broadcasters do not have captive audiences, presumably they pile-drive Santa music around the clock because people actually want to hear it around the clock. But who? Are there such people all around me, and I'm just oblivious to them? Am I offending a huge proportion of my readers by complaining about this? Who are these people who want to hear "The Little Drummer Boy" 27 times during the next three weeks?
Explain yourselves.
18 Comments:
By 
, at
Sat Dec 08, 03:10:00 PM:
I'm with you Tigerhawk! I don't want to hear Christmas music until about December 23rd!
By , at
Sat Dec 08, 03:15:00 PM:
I too feel the say way. I'm really sick of Christmas music - especially this year. My digital cable provider has 45 channels of MC (Music Channels) with two (2) channels devoted 100% to Christmas music. Not to mention some of the other channels like Easy Listening and Big Band & Swing slipping in a lot Christmas songs between their regular fare. Both Christmas music channels started the day after Thanksgiving. I couldn't believe it, so this year I've minimized my Christmas music listening as much as possible.
By 
GreenmanTim, at
Sat Dec 08, 03:33:00 PM:
I am a traditionalist when it comes to Christmas Music. I want my service of lessons and carols from King's College or some similar vast acoustical expanse of vaulted stone. I will happily sing carols with my children, and even with neighbors going door to door in the snow (but alas, nary a wassail bowl to be found). I like the Christmas Revels, particularly the pagan attributes of their rousing Yuletide offerings. And if I am at a dazzling holiday party - crystal, candlelight and sprigs of holly abounding - I'll take cool jazz renditions of some of the classic secular songs.
But that is it. The right music for the right mood. Cloying and annoying X-mas in a can ain't my style at all. Ditto the various "novelty" X-mas Tunes, which only rarely elicit a chuckle and never twice. This is why I almost never shop in Bricks and Mortar chains during the run up to the Holidays. That, and I don't want to deal with my fellow human beings during this season of love and brotherhood in the frenzied mosh pit of X-mas shopping.
You can keep your Great White North, Maxenzie Bros, and your Beer in a Tree. I'll take a stone fence - bourbon and sweet cider - and a warm fireside with Ella and Louie singing "Moonlight in Vermont", and you can keep your Chipmunks Christmas ditties to yourselves.
By , at
Sat Dec 08, 03:44:00 PM:
There is no Christmas music I enjoy quite as much as the Christmas music "I" make...and I'll sing EXTRA LOUD this year at Princeton's "Sing-Along Messiah" on Monday nite. Perhaps it might even penetrate Tigerhawk's "Bah Humbug" cone of silence ;-)
By , at
Sat Dec 08, 04:15:00 PM:
Shame on you for hating Jesus, Tigerhawk! ;)
By , at
Sat Dec 08, 04:23:00 PM:
I hate all music because music is unislamic.
Abdullah (a.k.a. Slave of God)
By , at
Sat Dec 08, 04:30:00 PM:
Tom Lehrer ( spelling) hit it on the nose a half-century ago with his Christmas carol.
One line for those who are not familiar: " Angels we have heard on high, tell us to go out and buy."
BTW, I remember my 8th grade baby sitter singing "Angels We Have Heard on High" in Assembly when I was in 1st grade, and then having my first exercise in singing harmony when I sang the song 7 years later when I was in 8th.
Best way to avoid Christmas songs overdose is to avoid shopping and turning on the radio.
By Gary Rosen, at
Sat Dec 08, 05:55:00 PM:
I could listen to Nat King Cole singing "The Christmas Song" 24 hours a day, and not just durig the Christmas season. In fact, I'm not even a Christian.
By Fausta, at
Sat Dec 08, 05:57:00 PM:
By , at
Sat Dec 08, 09:12:00 PM:
I LOVE Christmas music! www.eeradio.com
By SR, at
Sun Dec 09, 09:19:00 AM:
XM radio has multiple Christmas channels. The first one came on line before Thanksgiving. This was the PC channel: no Jesus, endless repeats of The Christmas Song, White Christmas, and Let is Snow.
Last night, though, I loved driving into San Francisco, fully lighted, listening to "I'll be Home for Christmas."
Sorry
By Diane / "Didi", at
Sun Dec 09, 10:53:00 AM:
I'm all for Christmas music, but in proportion, place and timing. I agree that the day after Thanksgiving (or actually the day *before* Thankgiving here in Moscow on the Willamette) is *way* too early. But I *do* enjoy Christmas music ... as long as it's not this pop crap ... give me crooners, classical, jazz, and soulful. I don't want to hear multiple versions of "Santa Baby", "I want a hippopotamus for Christmas" and all the other schlock non-stop ... mostly because when I wake up in the middle of the night it kicks into my brain and the "radio in my head" starts playing that crap and I can't go back to sleep.
It has nothing to with not loving Christmas itself, which I heartily do ... it's just that so much of modern Christmas "music" is so much crap.
By , at
Sun Dec 09, 12:25:00 PM:
I abhor "Christmas music". I am inspired by Christmas hymns. I have a number of Christmas CD's. None of them have Frosty or Rudolph or chestnuts. Three of them have Pavarotti singing Ave Maria.
By Charlottesvillain, at
Sun Dec 09, 02:31:00 PM:
I like Christmas music that sounds only slightly different from the music I usually listen to: Jazz, blues, Latin, old R&B. Charles Brown, Louis Armstrong, Lightening Hopkins, Chet Baker, Jimmy Smith, Etc. I dig out my collection every year and never get sick of it. TH, I'll lay a CD on you and see if I can't convert you.
But I don't listen to the radio and the mall is not part of my life, so I guess I don't have the bombardment that some deal with.
By , at
Sun Dec 09, 07:54:00 PM:
Getting married and having a new baby has trained me well; I can tune that shit out expertly. :)
By , at
Mon Dec 10, 02:13:00 AM:
In 1973 I was stationed at Camp Red Cloud, Uijongbu, Korea. Only those who have experienced the Korean winter can appreciate the cold and the “hawk” that blows down from Siberia. “Over the river and through the woods “ indeed.
You may recall that this was the time of the Arab oil embargo. Our quick thinking Commanding General decided that in order to save fuel the heat would be shut down in working areas at night and in the barrack during the day. I worked night shift and slept days. You can imagine.
Another of the General’s ideas was non stop Christmas music played over the camp PA system from Reveille to Taps.(Think those metal cone speakers from MASH. Real hi fi) Did I mention that I slept days?
Although I had been pretty indifferent to Christmas music before this, but for some unexplainable reason have absolutely detested it since.
By Miss Ladybug, at
Mon Dec 10, 02:14:00 AM:
I have a part-time retail job. We have the in-store much, and I guess corporate sends out the music we are supposed to be playing. They started with a variety that includes (but is not exclusively) Christmas music prior to Thanksgiving. Thank God I only work a few days a week for a few hours at a time...
That being said, I love Christmas music. But, I don't want to hear it 24/7 for 4-5 weeks running. I've got more Christmas CDs that I can name - all kinds of stuff: Bing, Frank and Nat; Andy Williams and John Gary; Chet Atkins; Celtic variations; various instrumental, and, yes, some from numerous pop and country artists from more recent years. I finally got around to taking my Christmas CDs out to the car today, and the first one I put in was a mixed CD I'd created a number of years ago to replace the mixed tapes I'd made even many more years previously.
By robert, at
Thu Sep 30, 08:00:00 AM:
Well, TigerHawk, you sound awfully Grinchly to me! I love the music of the season, and can't wait to start playing it, from around the end of November. Mind you, it helps to have dozens of CD's and old cassettes, as we do. Much less repetition that way.
Sure, Christmas is commercialized, and sometimes sappy, but as a Christian I'm happy to be reminded of the birth of my Saviour. As the saying goes, "Jesus is the reason for the season."
If you begin to loathe Christmas music, why not get together with a group of friends and go caroling? There are folks in hospital, or seniors who are shut-in, who would be delighted to see you. And it might help you to restore some of the joy!
And if you’ll excuse a brief “commercial:” With the arrival of fall, we begin to think of the Christmas season up ahead. If you do not have a good book on the subject of our Christmas carols, I encourage you to take a look at mine, Discovering the Songs of Christmas. In it, I discuss the history and meaning of 63 carols and Christmas hymns. The book is available through Amazon, or directly from Jebaire Publishing. (Might make a great gift too!)
