I was introduced to Christmas songs in Kindergarten. Before then, I had not heard any, due to the simple fact that, there in 1956, I was a nice little Jewish boy in Upstate New York.
I remember enjoying the novelty of Kindergarten, under the watchful eye of Mrs.VanDerLip. I met several similarly nice kids in those early years, a couple of whom I still regularly see on Facebook, but that's getting off-track.
A couple of months into my Public School life, where we had been doing 'art' and group singing, we were marched to a large hall and seated together. Then, to my shock and discomfort, everybody cheerfully and enthusiastically began singing songs THAT I DIDN'T KNOW.
For years, I had no clear idea who that 'round, young virgin' was, and I
wondered if our next-door neighbor, who we called Uncle Harold, was
related to those singing Harold Angels.
Eventually, when I realized that, in addition to being Jewish, I was left-handed, my life-long sense of being an Outsider was confirmed, but I'm getting off-track again.
As a piano-player, I soon came to realize that Christmas songs, despite the frequent references to You-Know-Who, were A) generally more interesting musically than Hannukah songs and B) received with joy by the listeners, so I learned to play all of them.
Which finally brings me to the best Christmas song of all time. Of course, it's "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas". The basic chords, the subtle but perfect evolution of the melodic line in each verse, and the wistful bridge, are all just right.
Then there are the words, and we now have the perfect sense of Christmas 2020.
I do have one quibble. If you watch the YouTube of Judy's original rendition in "Meet Me in St. Louis" (which you should), the phrase that was later rewritten as "hang a shining star upon the highest bough" was originally the much more realistic "until then we'll have to muddle through somehow".
Think about THOSE words when you hear it sung this year.
See you in 2021.
