Great to be back at Templemore, and what better time than in the midst of holiday celebration season? Photo by Kat.
What Makes Holiday Music Great?
It's a good question, but there's actually an answer. Many of the Christmas songs you know and love the most were composed by the best of the best in songwriters, or songwriting teams, during the 20th century. Many come from major Hollywood films.
Nat King Cole had a hit with "The Christmas Song" (yes, the "Chestnuts roasting on an open fire..." tune), a classic Christmas song written in 1945 by Robert Wells and Mel Tormé. "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" was written by Hugh Martin and Ralph Blane for the 1944 MGM musical 'Meet Me in St. Louis.' And "White Christmas" was written by Irving Berlin for the 1942 musical 'Holiday Inn,' and won the Academy Award for Best Original Song.
Side note: whenever you cover the best and most iconic singers in the world, be they Nat King Cole or Frank Sinatra or Marvin Gaye or otherwise, don't try to sing like them. It won't work, and makes it worse. Sing like you instead.
But there's definitely more than the fact that they're just well-crafted songs. Most people get a deep sense of nostalgia from hearing those seasonal tunes that harken back to their childhood. You associate the music with the fun and excitement of the holidays that you hopefully experienced as a kid. So as long as you don't burn out on them entirely — I have a hard and fast rule about "no holiday music" unless it's December 10-25 — they remain a welcome part of the season.
So, You're an Atheist Jew Who Celebrates Christmas, Right?
Yes, that's accurate. To break that down into understandable pieces, I've never in my life felt any connection to any type of religion, nor did I ever attend any kind of church. But I've always loved everything about Christmas itself, despite my lack of a belief in God. Perhaps of interest: I do live my life in many ways that are very much acceptable from a Judeo-Christian overview. Like, every one of the 10 Commandments all seem like good ideas to me. I consider myself a person of strong ethics, while also being as imperfect as any other person (more than some, less than others). I will say that most of what I know about Jesus makes him a guy who would be very much aligned with my peaceful, liberal, socially-minded outlook.
So, we really go the whole nine yards for Christmas here. I have a nicely decorated tree in my living room. I make a traditional feast that evening... roast beef, mashed potatoes, Yorkshire pudding.... the works. I generally spend too much on presents because I enjoy making my friends and family happy. I watch "A Christmas Carol" and "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas" at least once. I listen to Vince Guaraldi performing the jazz piano music of "A Charlie Brown Christmas" while cooking feasts or wrapping gifts.
This year's tree. Photo by Kat.
My favorite version of "A Christmas Carol" is actually the 1970 musical version called "Scrooge" starring Albert Finney in the title role along with luminaries like Alec Guinness, Edith Evans, and Kenneth More.
And then — adding confusion to this whole story — there's the fact that when I was just past 50 years old, I took a DNA test and discovered that genetically, I was about 80% Ashkenazi Jew. I had been totally unaware of this fact my entire life up to that moment. Some people don't know that being ethnically Jewish has no bearing on your participation of the religion of Judaism (though it typically works out that way).
Anyway, I mention that because, as you'll see in my set list below, I did acknowledge my Jewish background, in the form of a song, during my set at Templemore. It so happens that Hanukkah also starts on December 25 this year, so it felt right to give some love to the multitude of cultures from my genetic background. Plus, as I said... they're all good songs that I never get to otherwise play.
What Else Has Been Going On?
Oh, you know. It's my super busy time of year work-wise. It's no different than nearly any other years of my 30+ years career in the musical instrument/professional audio world. December is always rough, with daily big responsibilities and deadlines.
So that takes up a lot of my attention and tends to be a cause of far too much stress on a daily basis, but as I said, I'm quite familiar with both the process and the ensuing anxiety. I do seem manage to make it work every year, so that background is at least somewhat helpful in alleviating the shittier aspects of it. I am confident I'll get my shit done.
Beyond that... almost nothing. The small amount of spare time I have has been spent doing creative music work on the upcoming second album by my band They Stole My Crayon. We've gotten more serious about it in recent weeks, and things are back on track for an album to be wrapped up over the next few months.
What song was I working on specifically this weekend? It was the orchestrated outro of TSMC's new tune "Endgame." That may mean something to you after the album comes out.
How About That Show?
Super good. We had a reasonably good sized crowd that was very engaged and having a good time, and obviously appreciating the music. I ask for nothing more than that from my shows in SL.
Finding myself needing a refresh of my current list of holiday songs I've done many times before in SL, I ended up adding three new songs to my set. All went very well. Those, in addition to several of the Christmas songs I'd done previously and a few non-holiday tunes throw in, made fora pretty good set.
I've mentioned this before, but it's worth repeating. The creativity of Luis Lockjaw means that despite having played at Templemore does and dozens of times, it's often on a stage that is completely new to me. That makes it super fun. You never know what to expect until you arrive for the show. Photo by Kat.
Rockin' in a winter wonderland. Photo by Kat.
Peeping in at my show through hole in the wall. Photo by Kat.
One weird note: typically I'll do 12, maybe 13 songs tops in a one hour set. But I always forget that many of those Christmas tunes are relatively short, and this time it bit me in the ass... I wrapped up 13 tunes and still found myself with a good while remaining for my time onstage. So, I created a new one on the spot to take up the remaining minutes.
Lutz City of Templemore set list...
Save It For Later (English Beat)
Little Drummer Boy/Peace on Earth (Traditional/David Bowie)
River (Joni Mitchell)
*Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow! (Dean Martin)
Long December (Counting Crows)
Among the Leaves (Sun Kil Moon)
Man Of Constant Sorrow (Traditional)
*The Chanukah Song (Adam Sandler)
Holly Jolly Christmas (Burl Ives)
Northern Sky (Nick Drake)
The Christmas Song (Nat King Cole)
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas (Martin/Blane)
*It’s The Most Wonderful Time of the Year (Andy Williams)
*Christmas at Templemore (Zak Claxton)
*Indicates the first time I've performed this song in SL.
Huge thanks to everyone who came out tot he show, with extra super Santa thanks to the following who helped support it!
Luis Lockjaw, Trouble Streeter, Kat Claxton, AmyraVuitton Resident, my great manager Mallet Beck, and all of Templemore's excellent support staff!
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