While I retired from the radio industry more than eight years ago, I still follow various industry happenings. One of those of interest is that at least one station in every American city and many smaller communities play non-stop holiday music, some beginning as early as the day after Halloween until Christmas Day!
I’ve done very little listening to any of these stations, yet I have been tracking their activity from year to year thanks to contemporary music radio advisor Sean Ross, who writes a weekly column reviewing station activity. First, what’s behind so many stations veering away from their regular format to this seasonal programming? Simply, its popularity and increased audience ratings it delivers! What’s the attraction?
I’ve always believed that the foundation of the holiday season is all about tradition. At almost any of our ages, the holidays are universally a trip down memory lane to a happy, simpler, and easier time. The Christmas music — secular vs. non-secular is irrelevant in this mindset — is the Pavlovian conditioning that sets in motion all of our wonderful thoughts, memories, feelings, and emotions.
Chuck Knight
Those are the views of Chuck Knight, the former program director of B101 in Philadelphia, a position yours truly held decades earlier. You’ve read Chuck’s thoughts on this page in the past, as well as in my radio industry memoir. B101 became Philadelphia’s all-Christmas station shortly after the turn of the century.
Check out the “Precious Memories” link at the bottom of this page, and you’ll find the ten most popular titles as of just a few years ago … I doubt that there have been notable changes in the titles, although you’ll find more contemporary artists joining with the traditional ones long associated with a particular title.
While I haven’t consulted those truly in the know, it’s my opinion that the most popular modern holiday tune is “All I Want For Christmas Is You,” made popular in the 1990s by singer Mariah Carey. In recent years, a few other recordings of it have appeared, the latest by Barry Manilow … here’s his version:
One of the new recordings to be added by many stations is by pianist David Foster and his wife, singer Katharine McPhee … Carol of the Bells. If you hear any of David’s piano playing or Katharine’s singing, please write me; however, this comes from their new album, where many of the other selections do include her singing.
While we’re on the subject of actual Christmas carols, there are a few other fairly new recordings I found of interest … the first being by popular singer Carrie Underwood:
Next, a young lady who’s both a superb violinist and dancer and does a fair amount of both at the same time — here’s Lindsey Stirling performing the longtime favorite “Joy to the World”:
A duo, two brothers born in Australia but brought to the U. S. fairly early in life, are getting a fair amount of attention on the 24/7 holiday-programmed stations, go under the name For King & Country … here’s their version of “Go Tell It On the Mountain”:
One more in this category that is receiving significant airplay is the re-working of the popular classical melody, Pachelbel’s Canon … performed by the popular Trans-Siberian Orchestra under the title “Christmas Canon”:
If you find many of these arrangements fairly traditional in sound, that’s because this old guy comes from the traditional side of the musical spectrum, even though there are performances of a much more contemporary style, which I do enjoy.
While on the subject, my first involvement in programming holiday music in a major way came in 1963 — our first year on the air as a new FM station, WDVR, in Philadelphia. As opposed to today, back then, very few secular radio stations paid much attention to Christmas or holiday music. (Of course, their airwaves were filled with commercials related to holiday gift-giving.) In contrast, I chose to begin to lightly sprinkle in holiday melodies right after Thanksgiving, then slowly increase the percentage through December 24th. Then, on Christmas Eve, air what I named the Christmas Festival of Music through Midnight on December 25th.
Recently, I was asked how many years I had programmed holiday music …. My answer: Out of a career that spanned 60 years, I calculated was involved through the fall months of 35 of those years! During the Bonneville Broadcast Consultants years in the 1970s and 80s, my programming was being aired on upwards of 100 stations in cities across the nation … and many of those chose to publish a full-page ad listing all of the music being played during the Festival, which had been expanded to 36 hours, beginning at 12 Noon on the 24th. This required extra care to ensure song title and artist conflicts were avoided. In those days, it was all very much a manual eyeball process … meaning that I began work not much after Labor Day, as much lead time was required for the newspaper listings.
Returning to today’s holiday recordings … the popular pop singer Michael Buble has released a Christmas album that features covers of long-popular holiday tunes, including this one, which will forever be associated with just one person, the legendary Burl Ives; yet, many stations are now playing Michael’s version of “A Holly Jolly Christmas” along with Burl’s original:
There’s a Christmas song that I had never heard until I became involved with programming the Southern Gospel genre — a combination of Country music style arrangements melded with barbershop style four-part harmony — for XM/SiriusXM back in 2004, its title: “Beautiful Star of Bethlehem” … sung here by the Collingsworth Family. All six members, Mom, Dad, and the four children are talented singers as well as instrumentalists!
Finally, there’s a song associated with the holiday season, which I know you’ve heard — even if it was never one of your favorites. This year marks the 65th anniversary of its release back in 1958 … and it’s been popular ever since! Of course, I’m talking about Brenda Lee and “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree,” which she recorded at age 13!
While it has been among the most popular holiday songs throughout the years, it has never made it to the top of Billboard magazine’s weekly Hot 100 chart of most popular current songs in all of its 65 years … until this year, when it reached the pinnacle in mid-November!
Here’s Brenda, at age 78, performing it at a recent event. How different do you think she sounds from the original?
Before I go, I want to acknowledge Sean Ross for providing much of the data related to what’s being played and Rob Lucas, who was the programmer for WTSS in Buffalo, New York, where his station became a dominant radio force in the market during holiday time for 21 out of the last 22 years, even against direct competition. I appreciate Rob’s confidentially providing me with his detailed written instructions and success formula, which he’s offering to other station programmers on a consulting basis.
As always, thank you for reading … and I hope you enjoyed listening to some of the newer recordings of favorite Christmas and holiday melodies. Have a comment?
Dear Marlin, thanks for this amazing round up of Christmas Holiday programming news. Gotta say that Brenda Lee’s “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” premiered when I was a teen, and it’s still one of my all-time favorites! Love that she finally made #1 on Billboard’s Top 100 this year. Hope you have a lovely Christmas and a great New Year. Looking forward to many more of Marlin’s Musings in 2024.
Thank you, Deborah! Wishing the same to you two out there in Oregon!
The all Christmas format, is really the NEW Adult Standards. The target audience does not care for the year around music that a Bing, Andy, Mathis did or the Beautiful Music/Easy Listening music that Percy Faith did; but yet their Xmas records still hold up (likely because of their parents love for that music and music knowing it or not could be passed on to the children…as they hold the memories the children will have of their Christmas past). For those who want to go deep into the pre-rock pop; the online music stores and then some have made this all possible for those who are not taken by the current music trends and/or like I said…want to go deep into the Bing’s, Andy’s, Mathis’s, Percy’s and much more.
Marlin I was like most Gen Xers and Boomers. I did not like a lot of the BM/EZ arrangements and covers of my favorite songs. The all Xmas format kind of helped me revisited and got me to appreciate the BM/EZ style some what…enjoying how Percy Faith made some of the popular hit records his own (his take on Gilbert O’Sullivan’s Clair is all his own as well as Neil Diamond’s Crunchy Granola Suite, and Faith’s own arrangement of Freddie Hubbard’s First Light…and I like Hubbard’s intent as much as Faith’s take on it). Billy Vaughn really give Faith a run for the money with his version of Theme From a Summer Place as Vaughn’s album that had his version and the title track was his best selling album…Vaughn’s sax talents give his take a version that is equal to Faith’s (who had the hit record…and #1 at that).
BM/EZ paved the way for the James Last/Gheorghe Zamfir collaboration The Lonely Shepherd (one of the few BM/EZ radio hits it could really call its own) to be featured in the Kill Bill movies, and ABBA’s schalger sound of Europe made I Have a Dream an BM/EZ as well (while Dancing Queen was the big Top 40 hit in America). BM/EZ and pre rock pop also paved the way for likes of a Lindsey Sterling, the Celtic Woman shows, Sarah Brightman, Andrea Bocelli; even Jackie Evancho and Michael Buble. Classical Crossover’s emergence in part is because Beautiful Music/Easy Listening.
The all Christmas format began with KESZ (99.9 KEZ) in Phoenix; but the Westwood One Adult Standards format (which began under Transtar before that folded into Cumulus/Westwood One fold) did an all Xmas format with its Standards format for years before KEZ adapted it for the Adult Contemporary format.
Marlin, your insight on radio Marlin is great. Truly an underrated treasure in the business. You just latched on a format that the Lost Generation if not the Greatest Generation enjoyed. It is just younger people hated their music covered by the “hall of strings” as I like to call it…and I think the term is correct. I am thankful that you have written a book on your career. It covers an element of radio that needs to talked about and remember, so that we can understand certain things about the radio business.
Don, you’ve shared so many insightful comments and thoughts, I don’t know where to begin … so, since I don’t have much of a disagreement with what you’ve shared, I’ll let them stand.
It seems that from a very early time in my life, I had an inborn desire to be helpful and to bring happiness to others which, in turn, gave me personal joy. This is what guided my programming efforts throughout my career . . . what will bring joy to those I viewed as my prime audience, not what I personally liked. For some reason, I was gifted with an intuitive sense for doing that and given the opportunity to deliver.
Enough said for the moment – thank you for writing!