If I had my way, they would have stopped making new holiday albums 30 years ago.
Nothing against the later generations of singers, but other than tinkering with arrangements, there’s not much to improve upon with the versions recorded by the classic crooners: Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Perry Como, Andy Williams, Nat King Cole, Bing Crosby and Tony Bennett.
I don’t think anyone will ever make versions of “A Holly Jolly Christmas” or “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” better than Burl Ives’. Ditto with Como’s “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas,” although Dino and fellow Rat Packer Sinatra came close.
Jimmy Durante’s evocative version of “Frosty the Snowman” endures on the television special by that name, first aired in 1964.
A Google search reveals an eclectic list of musicians who have sung “Frosty”: Como, The Ronettes, Willie Nelson, Glen Campbell, Billy Idol and Michael Bublé.
My wife and I have somehow amassed a collection of holiday albums, as I discovered while rooting through the Christmas album shelf for this column — by contemporary artists including Vanessa Williams, Harry Connick Jr., Sarah McLachlan and Donny Osmond.
Most of these albums were gifts exchanged between us or received from others. Of these, I’ve most enjoyed Williams’ gospel-infused, Grammy-nominated album “Star Bright.”
On the same shelf was a gem by the essential crooner, Bennett. It’s his “Snowfall: The Tony Bennett Christmas Album,” which was originally recorded in 1968 and reissued in 1994.
That needs to be in my car’s CD player.
I began to formulate this column while driving to an assignment Thursday, the grand opening of the PennDOT driver license center in Exeter Township
The local rock station, WRFY, has been playing nothing but holiday music this month. Many of the songs on the playlist are those by the classic crooners mentioned above.
But they’re also airing songs by contemporary singers like Bublé and Mariah Carey.
It would be our loss if Mariah Carey hadn’t lent her amazing vocal range to “O Holy Night” in her 1994 album “Merry Christmas,” which would be the last holiday album under my 30-year rule.
Upon further review, 30 years may be overly arbitrary. Like the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame there should be some exemptions so bona fide contemporary crooners like Bublé and John Legend make the cutoff. They’re so good at what they do, so why not let them put their voice to these incredible songs?
As I was driving on Route 422 to my assignment, Willie’s “Frosty” came on. As with all of his songs, whether he wrote them or someone else did, he made it his own.
Nelson’s “Frosty” is included among his 2012 collection, “Willie Nelson-The Classic Christmas Album.”
How that album is not in my holiday music collection is beyond me.