Sounds of the Season

A Denver radio station has been advertising that from now until the New Year they will be playing only seasonal music, and I have to say this is a great marketing strategy if you are looking to have people boycott your station. Seriuosly, who wants to listen to Christmas music for 2 months straight? Not me! And before you label me a grinch, let me assure you that I enjoy the classic Christmas carols: Little Drummer Boy, Carol Of The Bells, Deck The Halls, etc. However, there are only so many variations of these that are tolerable - I am reminded of a CD we had at my last job that featured a version of O'Tannenbaum, sung by very operatic voices who not only weren't following the standard tune, they didn't even seem to be singing related notes. I actually only know what song it is supposed to be because I looked at the liner notes. Absolutely unbearable. My daughter plays better music with her plastic piano, which only has four keys and she plays with her fists. Of course, if you stick to the classics only, it is bound to get more than a little repetitive, which of course is why people are continually trying to write new Christmas songs. I can pretty much say that as a group these all blow. With the exception of Santa Baby and All I Need For Christmas Is You, there are no good modern Christmas songs* - and I think that's fine. I want to hear and sing the carols I grew up listening to - the classics are classics because they are good. There is absolutely no need for any new Christmas songs, except to fill the hours and hours of air time needed by idiot radio statoins that want to drive everyone crazy by playing nothing else.

*I would like to add Jingle Bell Rock and Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer to my list of acceptable modern Christmas songs.