Merry Christmas, Baby

From Blue Christmas to Christmas blues........

Merry Christmas, Baby has been recorded a surprisingly number of times in the first dozen years or so into this century. I'm not sure who inspired the flurry of activity, but it may have been the recording released by Bruce Springsteen back in 1978.

The song was first recorded in Los Angeles in 1947 by Johnny Moore's Three Blazers featuring Charles Brown on vocal.

 

 

 

It remained popular over the next several Christmas seasons and as one record label was bought out by another, the recording appeared on several labels.

On 27 October 1950, the Lionel Hampton Orchestra recorded it with Sonny Parker on vocal.

 

Johnny Moore wasn't done with the song and neither was Charles Brown.
Around 1952 Moore recorded it again when he was with Modern Records and had his common law wife, Mari Jones, do the vocal. I don't believe this recording was ever issued until 2007.

 

By the 4th of September 1956, Charles Brown was performing on his own and was doing a recording session in New Orleans with many of the legendary NOLA studio musicians and he recorded the song again. This time it was released on Aladdin Records, and 5 years later on Imperial after they acquired Aladdin.

 

Up to this point the song had remained outside of the mainstream pop market. All that changed on the 19th of November 1958 when rock 'n' roll hero Chuck Berry recorded it in Chicago. Chuck's recording, with some great ivory tinkling by Johnnie Johnson, is well known so below is offered an alternate take recorded at that session.

 

The following year, 1959, finds Charles Brown still in New Orleans and still recording Merry Christmas Baby. This time it came out as a single on Teem Records.

 

In fact, Charles would go on to record the song several more times. In 1968 new recordings were issued by both King and Kent Records and in 1970 another version came out on Jewel and he didn't stop there. If you do happen to hear Charles singing Merry Christmas Baby on the radio, it is most likely one of these later recordings, but we're going to leave Charles in the 1950's.

Just as Chuck Berry exposed the song to an entire new market in 1958, in 1964 Ike and Tina Turner turned it into a soul blaster! I was undecided whether to feature the mono version or stereo version of this. The stereo mix somewhat diminishes the backing vocals by The Ikettes, but the mono version compresses the horn section to the point they almost sound like they're in the next room, so the stereo won out. This version of the song even inspired 73 year old Mae West to record a rousing rock 'n' soul version of it in 1966. I thought about adding that to this post, but decided against it. It has nothing to do with the evolution of the song.

 

 In 1967 newly crowned international soul king Otis Redding recorded his own upbeat version of the song with the backing of Booker T. & The MG's. Unfortunately, just as the 1967 Christmas season was getting underway, Otis was killed in a plane crash. The song hit the airwaves at Christmas 1968.

 

Bruce Springsteen tours were a huge event in the late 70's, as they remain all these years later, and Christmas season performances always included some Christmas songs. In 1978 he released a live recording of Merry Christmas, Baby that is an unabashedly tip of the hat to Otis Redding and also opened the song up to yet another semi-generation.