# The relationship between Jazz and Christmas: Why are so many popular Christmas songs so jazzy? Videos

- Link: https://jazzblues.eu/2024/12/28/the-relationship-between-jazz-and-christmas-why-are-so-many-popular-christmas-songs-so-jazzy-videos/
- Published: 2024-12-28T00:04:23+01:00
- Author: https://JazzBlues.EU

**The relationship between the secular Christmas music that emerged in the 1930s,’
40s, ’50s and ’60s, and jazz is that both drew heavily from the same source—the 
Broadway songbook—for the same aesthetic reasons.**

In my music history classes, particularly in November and December, students have
often asked me about the relationship between jazz and Christmas: “Why are so many
popular Christmas songs so jazzy?” It is a good question—indeed, many of the most
popular secular Christmas music does have a jazz flavor, while a few are actually
jazz. There is a direct connection between jazz and Christmas music, but to see 
what that connection is, we will first look at the history of Christmas music from
the secular realm as it emerged in the 20C.

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“Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town,” his most famous song, was thus written by a Broadway
composer during a time when popular music consisted of swing bands and singers who
regularly performed music from the popular musicals of the time. From that perspective,
we can see that “Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town” is essentially a Broadway song in
32-bar AABA form, albeit without an accompanying theatrical component. (Strangely,
the 32-bar AABA has long since disappeared from popular music, where the “Verse-
Chorus” song form dominates the genre.) That was remedied in 1970, some 36 years
later, when the Rankin/Bass show of the same name fleshed out the song’s lyrics 
and created a one-hour, stop-motion Christmas special that provides a complete narrative
that is far beyond anything implied by the lyrics—the story focusses on Santa’s (
aka “Kris Kingle,” voiced by Mickey Rooney) “backstory” as told by a mailman, voiced
by Fred Astaire no less, and a host of other new characters including single Santa’s
wife-to-be, “Jessica.”

A few years later, in 1949, “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” the tune that was 
destined to become a franchise-founding juggernaut, arrived as a song based on the
wildly successful children’s story by Robert L. May that began as part of a Christmas
marketing campaign for Montgomery Ward. By 1946, there were over six million copies
of the book in the hands of children nationwide. In an odd but serendipitous happenstance,
May’s brother-in-law was the successful composer/songwriter Johnny Marks. Mays asked
him to write a song based on his book, to which Marks agreed, and in 1949, “Rudolph
the Red-Nosed Reindeer” was premiered by Gene Autrey and was a double platinum hit
record in its first year alone.

, The Ink Spots and Sammy Kaye. However, it was his Christmas music that cemented
his lasting legacy as a songwriter. He wrote Brenda Lee’s smash hit “Rockin’ Around
the Christmas Tree,” “Holly Jolly Christmas,” “Silver and Gold,” and many others
from the many Rankin/Bass Christmas specials that followed “Rudolph the Red-Nosed
Reindeer.”

Like “Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town,” “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” is a 32-bar
AABA form. Like many other Christmas songs, these songs are regularly covered by
top-tier jazz musicians like Ella Fitzgerald, who featured both tunes on her first
Christmas album, _Ella Wishes You a Swinging Christmas_ (Verve, 1960).

 found them to be worthy vehicles for instrumental explorations.

Now let us do a couple of small “thought experiments”—first, listen to Ella Fitzgerald’s
version of Coots’ “A Precious Thing Called Love” and imagine that the lyrics were
changed to be a Christmas-themed love song or a story about “hot toddies by the 
yuletide fireplace” or something similar.

In the case of Coots’ tune rewritten with Christmas lyrics, I submit that it would
be indistinguishable, in terms of its mood and overall character, from other Christmas
songs. (This version even has a bluesy intro that would be right at home in the 
campy cabaret tune, “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch,” from the 1966 cartoon based
on Dr. Seuss’ children’s book from 1957, _How the Grinch Stole Christmas_.)

 the following year. Try to imagine the piece with different lyrics—perhaps something
to do with “newfound love” or something similar. As before, this could easily be
a solo aria or a so-called “I Want/I Wish” song from a musical by Lerner and Lowe
or Rodgers and Hart.

These examples clearly show that the only thing that separates the Broadway musical
theater music of this period and the secular Christmas music that arose in the 1940s,’
50s, and ’60s is _the lyrics_—the forms, harmonies, and melodies are indistinguishable
from each other.

Moreover, the Broadway connection runs deep. Along with Coots, we find many other
Broadway composers involved in writing popular and enduring Christmas music, including:

 * Hugh Martin, who wrote “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” (1944), was a
   Broadway composer of high renown. He worked on “The Boys from Syracuse (1938),“
   Best Foot Forward” (1941), “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1949), and others.
 * Albert Hague, who wrote “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch” (1966), was a classically
   trained composer who was successful on Broadway and in Hollywood. His notable
   Broadway work includes “Redhead” (1959), and “Plain and Fancy” (1955), which 
   features the jazz standard “Young and Foolish.”
 * Jule Styne, who wrote “Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow” (1945), was another
   Broadway composer who collaborated with Hugh Martin on “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes(
   1949), “Gypsy” (1959), and “Funny Girl.” The song “People,” from “Funny Girl,”
   was a big hit for Barbara Streisand, and was also covered by jazz pianist Bill
   Evans.
 *  wrote “White Christmas,” which was a big hit for Bing Crosby and was featured
   in the film/musical “Holiday Inn” (1942). Berlin also wrote some of the most 
   famous musicals of the time, like “Annie Get Your Gun” (1946), “Miss Liberty”(
   1949) and “Call Me Madam” (1950).

What is it about Broadway songs that make them so perfect for secular Christmas 
music? First, they were written by genius songwriters whose ability to marry lyrics
with melodies and supporting harmonies was unsurpassed. Many were classically trained
composers who drew unabashedly from the Romantic Era (1820-1900), including composers
like Robert Schumann, Franz Schubert, Johannes Brahms, and Hugo Wolf. From those
composers, they learned how to effectively move through distant key areas, which
provides colorful “patches” that are surprising and delightful. They also brought
rich harmonies, full of chromaticism, into the Broadway songs and coupled them with
soaring lyricism in the melodies. They used the major 7th chord as a stable tonic
harmony, which is not found in classical music. (This was done simultaneously in
the Blues, as those musicians casually used the dominant 7th chord as a stable tonic
as well! See my article on “Harmonic Convergence in Jazz and Classical Music, Part
1: The Blues” for details.)

Today, we are entirely accustomed to a major 7th chord as a stable tonic, but we
must nonetheless acknowledge the fact that the major 7th is a strong dissonance 
that occurs between the root of the tonic chord and the 7th. Ending a piece on a
major 7th chord is not as “complete” as ending it on a major triad. There is, in
fact, an element of it being unresolved that brings with it a heightened sense of
romanticism, sentimentalism, and yearning for closure that does not arrive, yet 
is comforting nonetheless. It has the whiff of melancholy, which conjures feelings
of nostalgia, intensifying the romanticism and making it more poignant and tender.
The example below plays all three in succession—a major triad, a major 7th, and 
finally, a major 7th chord.

In some very real way, these tunes are never “finished”—they do, obviously, have
a temporal end. However, the dissonance in the major 7th tonic makes it somewhat
of a restless spirit that haunts and teases us with a partial resolution that never
fully arrives. This phenomenon provides this music with a “harmonic romanticism”
that exists at the subconscious level and gives it, along with the more visible 
elements in the melodies and key changes, the power to enchant and enthrall in a
way that music that ends with triads cannot.

The Broadway composers accessed the richness of the harmonies but did so by combining
them with the popular song aesthetics of the time. This meant, more or less, “plugging”
them into a set of song templates, of which the 32-bar AABA was one of the most 
successful and popular. The ubiquitous 32-bar AABA, in comparison to the forms of
some of the classical songs, which were more complex, provided a simple form that
allowed for almost instantaneous familiarity, owing to the repeated A section, the
refreshing movement away from the home key in the B section, and the gratifying 
return “back home” to the A section.

In Broadway songs, all of these elements combined to create powerfully emotional,
sentimental, whimsical and even humorous music that defined the genre in its “golden
age.” This is why the Broadway song aesthetic is such a good fit for secular Christmas
music, which needs to convey the same thing, namely strong romantic, emotional content,
while also being tinged with an air of tender sadness, longing, and nostalgia.

Jazz in Christmas music reached its apogee with the soundtrack to the animated Peanuts
Christmas Special, _A Charlie Brown Christmas_. His recording _A Charlie Brown Christmas_(
Fantasy, 1965) features jazz-inflected versions of classic Christmas music like “
O Tannenbaum,” Felix Mendelssohn’s “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing,” and Guaraldi’s
version of what by then had become a new, secular Christmas classic, Mel Torme’s“
A Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire).” The recording also contains
five original tunes by Guaraldi: “My Little Drum,” “Linus and Lucy,” “Christmas 
Time Is Here” (instrumental version and vocal version, the latter with lyrics written
by Lee Mendelson, producer of some of the franchise’s shows), “Skating,” and “Christmas
Is Coming.”

Since “A Charlie Brown Christmas” first aired in 1965, Guaraldi’s music has become
a staple of the holiday soundtrack. The music has found a home deep in the culture,
far surpassing the animated show’s cultural impact. As such, the music has an inextricable
association with the Christmas season—in particular, “Christmas Time Is Here” has
long since been elevated to the status of a bona fide Christmas classic.

, and a smattering of improvisation to mark it, indelibly, as jazz. That said, it
was written to support the television special, and it is an accompaniment that knows
its place. It is not the center of attention, and, as such, its range of expression,
as jazz, is tempered and confined to its purpose.

The soundtrack was wildly successful, selling over four million copies by the early
1970s, making it one of the most popular jazz recordings of all time. It is a bit
curious, though—a children’s cartoon with a jazz soundtrack is not something one
would expect to work well, but with Guaraldi’s masterful songwriting and arranging,
it was the perfect and genuinely indispensable musical counterpart to the show. 
The Peanuts show itself is, strangely, simultaneously both celebratory and melancholic,
even perhaps maudlin at times. Yet Guaraldi, with remarkable artistry and sensitivity,
deftly weaves the joy, pensiveness, nostalgia, and childlike innocence together 
into an evocative, reflective and unified whole that perfectly supports and enhances
the story—indeed, one can not imagine the show without Guaraldi’s jazz soundtrack.

Let us run our thought experiment again on Guaraldi’s music—could “Christmas Time
is Here” be turned into a Broadway ballad by changing the lyrics? Absolutely. It
has all the hallmarks of a great Broadway tear-jerker—memorable melody, rich harmony,
32-bar AABA form with a surprising key change to a distant key (♭VI) in the B section,
and overt chromaticism that tugs at the heartstrings. All of those things combine
to make a great Christmas song _and_ a great Broadway tune.

, have found considerable success playing pop music covers from the 1960s onward.)

The relationship between the secular Christmas music that emerged in the 1930s, ’
40s, ’50s and ’60s, and jazz is that both drew heavily from the same source—the 
Broadway songbook—for the same aesthetic reasons. Their roots are in the same genre;
thus, they share some of the same musical “DNA.” As they became recognizable styles,
these two genres evolved with similar characteristics that inextricably link them
together as part of the Broadway family tree.

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