Season’s greetings fellow tourists! I hope all is well during this Holiday season and that you’ve all been enjoying the advent calendar I made for all of you (click -> here <- if you missed last weeks Souvenir). Now although my last Souvenir was so awesome I probably could have left you all with that as my last souvenir of this year, I realized that I still had times before finals here at SDSU really got rolling to write about one more souvenir for everyone. So as my last Souvenir of the Week for this year I present to you the album A Charlie Brown Christmas by American jazz group, the Vince Guaraldi Trio.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AZAo3Ia7DE
A Charlie Brown Christmas was the fifth studio album by the Vince Guaraldi Trio, being released in the December of 1965. Originally the soundtrack for the Christmas special of the same name, this album quickly became a classic Christmas album having sold 3,410,000 copies as of November 2014. Also, it has been added to the Library of Congress’s National Recording Registry list of “culturally, historically, or aesthetically important” sound recordings.
Featuring covers of classic Christmas songs such as O Tannenbaum, The Christmas Song, and Hark, The Heralds Sing, I feel that this album offers a more reserved and almost classy take on the holiday spirit which so often is extravagant and loud. This reserved sound is pleasantly able to stay out of the somber side of the season, allowing for the cheeriness of the season to still be felt in a more muted manner.
Along with the classic Christmas songs their are a few original songs by the Vince Guaraldi trio, such as Linus and Lucy, Christmas Time Is Here, and Skating. These songs will no doubt bring up nostalgic memories of Christmas seasons past for those who remember watching the Christmas special when they were young. But for those few who never saw the special, these tracks will be just as pleasant as the covers of the Christmas standards previously mentioned. While some of these original tracks, such as both versions of Christmas Time Is Here, further add to the more reserved and classy take on the holiday spirit; the other tracks Skating and Linus and Lucy offer more outright festive and upbeat music.
If you weren’t already familiar with this album and how beautiful it is, as a Christmas album or solely as a jazz album, then I’m glad to have been able to share it with you now. Some of my favorite tracks are Christmas Time Is Here (both versions), Skating, O Tannenbaum, and The Christmas Song.
I hope that you all are able to find a moment or two this holiday season when you can take a break to relax and enjoy this album, I’m sure you deserve it. If you’ve been following along every week or this is your first time, I just want to thank you all for allowing me to share my souvenirs with you these past couple of months. So, for the last time this year, thank you again for reading, happy listening, happy holidays, and happy new year.
Photo credit: http://www.amazon.com/Charlie-Brown-Christmas-Vince-Guaraldi/dp/B002Y1OAJU