We're in the home stretch of the look back at highlights from the first 100 episodes of Twelve Songs, with this episode getting into interviews during the pandemic when COVID affected everybody's plans. Guitarist and producer Chas Justus from Lafayette, Louisiana talks about how COVID made his collection of Cajun French versions of Chrlstmas classics--Joyeux Noel, Bon Chrismeusse--possible.
I really appreciated getting romantic pianist and composer Jim Brickman on the show because someone who has 10 albums of Christmas music has a more nuanced take on it than those who have only dipped their toes in the water. We talked in 2020 about how his Christmas music relates to the music he makes the rest of the year.
Many of my guests are indie musicians, in part because their music frequently lines up best with my aesthetics and ethics, but it's also important to me that we hear Christmas music as something people make today in a variety of forms and not simply nostalgia from our parents or grandparents' generations. Excerpts of conversations with retro soul artist Kelly Finnigan (who made the modern classic A Joyful Sound), Christian vocal group leader Ernie Haase, Jamie Hilsden of the Christmas punk band The Myrrhderers, and Amy Carlson of pop band Office Romance all come from that place, though the conversations are very different.
I hope after hearing this show and the other retrospective shows in this series, you'll want to subscribe to Twelve Songs (if you haven't already), listen to back episodes, and tell your friends. I hope these looks back make it clear that conversations about Christmas music aren't necessarily about Christmas or to be set aside until that time of year.
"Joyeux Noël, Bon Chrismeusse" from Lafayette with Chas Justus
Peggy Lee with Holly Foster-Wells
Amy Grant's "A Christmas Album" and Patrick Droney
"Do They Know It's Christmas" with Michaelangelo Matos and Flaming Lips' Steven Drozd
George Winston, The Bird and The Bee, The Myrrhderers, and Mento Buru
Calexico, Grant-Lee Phillips, and Peggy Lee
Big Freedia and Kelly Finnigan
Judith Owen and Harry Shearer, and Office Romance
Jim Brickman and the Return of Trans-Siberian Orchestra
Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips
"Just Like Christmas" with Low
The Goo Goo Dolls and Tori Kelly
"Mele Kalikimaka" with Ana Cristina Cash
Janie Fricke
The Beatles' Christmas Recordings with Jonathan and Julia Pretus of "Ranking the Beatles"
Rhonda Vincent, and Carrie Underwood's "The Gift"
Mega Ran
Christmas Music on the Billboard Charts with Chris Molanphy
"A Jazzy Little Christmas" with Ernie Haase and Signature Sound
"Hard Candy Christmas," with Alexandra Scott
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