Christmastime has long since been celebrated with a whole host
of items and traditions that we associate only with Christmas;
Christmas trees, decorations, Christmas ornaments and Santa Claus
to name a few - but Christmas wouldn't be the holiday that we all
love without Christmas songs! Every year, we hear a select few
songs that instantly make us feel festive and help us to embrace
the holidays - but where did this tradition of Christmas songs
begin?
Nowadays, the Christmas tunes we hear are all modern
arrangements with modern instruments, a backing track and modern
rhyming vocals. But the tradition of music and singing at
Christmastime started way back in the early centuries, when chants
and hymns were treated in a way that was festive and fun, making
them into what we now know as carols. Christmas carols in the
English language first appeared in 1426, when a priest and poet
from Shropshire listed 25 carols of Christmas that were sung by a
group of wassailers who went from house to house singing the songs.
Since then, music has become a huge part of Christmas celebrations
and festivities. Some traditional Christmas carols include:
- Away in a Manger
- Deck the Halls
- Good King Wenceslas
- Hark! The Herald Angels Sing
- The Holly and the Ivy
- I Wonder as I Wander
- Joy to the World
- O Little Town of Bethlehem
- Silent Night
- The Twelve Days of Christmas
- While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks
All of the songs mentioned above have been around for hundreds
of years, and you'll probably hear them at Christmastime sung by
choirs, at school productions or by carollers. Christmas carols are
not commonly heard on the radio or television, although you may
hear them during certain times of the Christmas period.
Traditional songs have a religious theme, and so are referred to
as Christmas carols, but popular Christmas songs that refer
to Christmas that do not have overtly religious tones are referred
to as plain Christmas songs and cannot be called 'Christmas
carols'. Some of the most popular songs that we listen to today
date back as early as 1934 - Winter Wonderland and Santa Claus Is
Coming to Town were both published in 1934, and they are two of the
most popular songs that are still played throughout the Christmas
period to date.
Other popular Christmas songs still played today were actually
introduced through motion pictures - Bing Crosby's White Christmas,
for instance, first came onto our screens in the film Holiday Inn
in 1942, and Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas from the film
Meet Me in St. Louis in 1944. You can even find
free Christmas music online at some Christmas websites
The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers are
responsible for a huge number of our popular Christmas songs today
- Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire, Winter Wonderland, Santa
Claus is Coming to Town, The Little Drummer Boy, Blue Christmas,
Frosty the Snowman, Do They Know it's Christmas?, I Saw Mommy
Kissing Santa Claus and Santa Baby to name but a few. But the ASCAP
are not the only Christmas song writers - Johnny Marks, a
songwriter, wrote three of our most popular Christmas songs, the
most of any writer to date - Rockin Around the Christmas Tree, A
Holly Jolly Christmas and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.
There are also a huge number of UK Christmas songs that became
popular in the 1970s and 1980s as chart music and getting the
number one Christmas single became a concern of musicians and
singers - songs such as Slade's Merry Xmas Everybody, Chris de
Burgh's A Spaceman Came Travelling and Cliff Richard's Mistletoe
and Wine are amongst the highest played holiday songs in the
UK.
Even though Christmas music is a huge part of our Christmas
traditions, we don't listen to the same songs year on year - new
releases such as the Darkness' Christmas Time (Don't Let the Bells
End) and Justin Bieber's new album Under the Mistletoe are also
played, although it may take a few years or decades for them to
become classic songs that we associate with Christmas.