Tag Archives: fred astaire

25 Days, 25 Songs — Day 11: “Happy Holiday (Beef Wellington Remix)”

25 Days, 25 Songs — Day 11: “Happy Holiday (Beef Wellington Remix)”

While not technically a Christmas song, the Irving Berlin composed, Bing Crosby sung, “Happy Holiday” is forever linked to Christmas because it is now most commonly associated with inclusive holiday greetings used during the Christmas and holiday season and because the numerous recordings of it on Christmas themed albums. It first appeared in the 1942 film Holiday Inn, and served as a theme song for the entertainment venue called “Holiday Inn” Bing Crosby’s character Jim Hardy has opened. The premise is that the ‘Inn’ will only be open for guests and shows on Holidays, that is why the lyrics wish for the listener is to have ‘the calendar keep bringing happy holidays to you’. Opening night is on New Years Eve and this is the song he sings. Also starring Fred Astaire, in 1943, the film received an Academy Award for Best Original Song (Irving Berlin for “White Christmas”).

In 2003 producer Brendan Wood, under his stage name Beef Wellington, remixed the original recording on Six Degrees Records Christmas remixed album. He adds a swinging beat and accentuates the horns for one of the most successful uses of the sub-genre of Christmas music, the remix (which is often just adding an electronic beat to a famous recording).

The accompanying video, using the famous scene where Happy Holiday is first sung, has Fred Astaire performing one of his most iconic dances. Ted Hanover, (Astaire’s character) is drunk because Lila Dixon (Virginia Dale), his dance partner and lover, has run off on New Years Eve. He drives up to his old friend Jim’s new club and madness ensues as he stumbles out on the dance floor. Pretending to be drunk, Fred still out dances 99.9% of people in the world and Linda Mason (Marjorie Reynolds) is no slouch herself.

Since I discovered this version of the holiday classic in 2008 it has been on heavy rotation each holiday season, a toe-tapping, head-bobbing good time and one of the few remixes that improves the original.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaeB4Yi06AY

25 Days, 25 Songs — Day 9: “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town”

Date line November 1934, the place Eddie Cantor’s radio show, the event “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” debuts. John
Frederick Coots and Haven Gillespie had no idea this night and this song would change their lives. By Christmas of that year they had sold 400,000 copies of the sheet music for the song (100,000 ordered the night after it aired), making it an instant Christmas classic.

The earliest recorded version was by banjoist Harry Reser and his band with Tom Stacks on vocal in 1934 and followed the next year by Tommy Dorsey & His Orchestra. In 1963 The Four Seasons charted with it and it has been recorded in Spanish by Luis Miguel. It is also another tune that Rankin – Bass made into a TV special, this time with Fred Astaire doing the singing and narrating the hour long special.

It is this special that introduced me, and probably many from my generation to the song, but it was the rock and roll version by Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band that made it cool when I was a teenager. Recorded live in 1978 and released in 1985 as the b-side of “My Hometown,” it is one I look forward to breaking out each year.