SHOW NOTES:

Two of the most popular Christmas Songs (aside from Mariah Carey’s cloying All I Want for Christmas Is You) are I’ll Be Home for Christmas (Kim Gannon, Walter Kent, Buck Ram) from 1943, introduced by Bing Crosby; and Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas (Hugh Martin and Ralph Blane) introduced by Judy Garland in 1943, also. Frank Sinatra later recorded the canonical version of each of them.

The year 1943 was in the middle of World War II. These songs, unrealized by many who hear them today and unaware of the origins, are not sincere expressions of happiness of holidays spent together. They are lamentations, expressing a wish to return home to the safety and comforts and love of family. They were meant to represent the soldiers in the Pacific and in Europe who lived in horrible conditions, faced the possibility of death daily, were often ill, too cold, too hot, and too lonely.

The lyrics such as “Christmas Eve will find me, where the love light gleams, I’ll be home for Christmas if only in my dreams,” and “We’ll all be together again if the fates allow, but until then we’ll have to muddle through somehow” (later “lightened” to “Hang the Brightest Star Upon the Highest Bough”) convey the intense nostalgia for better times.

Think about that background as you consider Christmas this year. We still have soldiers away from home, in harm’s way, separated from their loved ones. We’re fortunate to have them, and we’re fortunate for our freedoms and liberty.

Merry Christmas!