Holiday Gift Guide Review: “The Classic Christmas Album” Series

Johnny Mathis. Frank Sinatra. Perry Como. Steve Vai? Menudo? When it comes to Christmas music, Legacy Recordings doesn’t pull its punches. The label’s series of Classic Christmas Album releases has become a bit of an annual tradition, and this year’s batch of single- and various-artist anthologies once again draws on names both expected and unexpected. While the packages are bare-bones, with no liner notes (but happily with full credits and discographical annotation), the music most certainly is not.

Johnny Mathis recorded his first Christmas album in 1958 and his most recent in 2013; it’s no wonder that the eternally silky vocalist has become one of the artists most associated with the holiday music genre. Hot on the heels of Legacy’s Complete Global Albums Collection for Mathis – which itself features one new-to-CD Christmas album from the artist, 1963’s The Sounds of Christmas – producers Didier C. Deutsch and Jeff James have gone the extra mile for Mathis’ Classic Christmas Album. Two previously unissued tracks make their first appearances anywhere, both from a September 1961 session with Percy Faith’s orchestra – Harold Adamson and Jimmy McHugh’s jovial “Ol’ Kris Kringle” and “Give Me Your Love for Christmas,” from the same session. The latter is the title of Mathis’ 1969 Christmas album, named for a Jack Gold/Phyllis Stohn song. The pair is credited here, but this newly-discovered ballad is wholly different from the more pop-flavored 1969 track. Two single sides arranged and conducted by the great Gene Page in 1979 make their first appearance on CD here – “Christmas in the City of the Angels” b/w “The Very First Christmas Day.” 1970’s surprisingly funky, socially-conscious “Sign of the Dove,” the B-side to the lilting “Christmas Is” (also included here), is another new-to-CD track. These rare treats are joined by highlights such as Mathis’ 2006 duet with Bette Midler of “Winter Wonderland/Let It Snow,” his incomparable 1958 rendition of “Sleigh Ride,” and 2013’s “Home for the Holidays.” Maria Triana has beautifully remastered all tracks.

Frank Sinatra’s Classic Christmas Album also finds room for rarities. This set features 14 holiday favorites from Young Blue Eyes’ Columbia Records period, long before he was “The Chairman of the Board.” At Columbia, Sinatra was, simply, “The Voice” – the voice which inspired bobbysoxers to riot and listeners everywhere to swoon. In sharp contrast to his later, swingin’ period (which is foreshadowed by tracks here like “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” and “Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!” from 1948 and 1950, respectively), the tone here is largely reverential. This collection, which has the entirety of the 1948 10-inch LP Christmas Songs by Sinatra, also offers two spirituals featuring The Charioteers first issued on a 1947 single (“Jesus is a Rock (In a Weary Land)” and “I’ve Got a Home in That Rock”); both are somewhat unusual fare for a holiday album.  You’ll hear pure recordings from The Voice on “Silent Night,” “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear” and “Adeste Fideles.” Sinatra is equally affecting and bittersweet on “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” which like most of these tracks was arranged and conducted by his first great collaborator, Axel Stordahl. Two previously unissued performances round out this fine compilation: a loose take of Frank Loesser’s “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” with soprano Dorothy Kirsten and an alternate version of Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne’s “Let It Snow!” with the Page Cavanaugh Trio. This alternate is radically different than the 1950 version as it takes the song as a soft ballad rather than as a big-band swinger. Sinatra performed “Baby” with Kirsten on 1949’s Light Up Time radio program; it’s a real treat as the song wasn’t subsequently recorded in the studio by Sinatra. “Let It Snow” with Cavanaugh dates to 1946’s Songs by Sinatra show. Sound is top-notch courtesy of Maria Triana’s remastering.

After the jump: a look at Perry Como, Barbra Streisand and more!