This popular Xmas song, written in 1963, was recorded and released that year by pop singer Andy Williams for his 1st Xmas album, The Andy Williams Christmas Album. However, the song wasn't released as a promotional single by Williams' record label (Columbia Records) that year, as they instead opted to promote his cover of White Christmas as the official promo single from the album. The song peaked at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 2007 and reached into the top 10 consistently in the 2000s, peaking at #5 in 2020 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart in USA. The song is a celebration and description of activities associated with the Xmas season, focusing primarily on get-togethers between friends and families. Among the activities included in the song is the telling of "scary ghost stories," a Victorian Xmas tradition that has mostly fallen into disuse, but survives in the seasonal popularity of numerous adaptations of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. Other activities mentioned include hosting parties, spontaneous visits from friends, universal social gaiety, spending time with loved ones, sledding for children, roasting marshmallows, sharing stories about previous Xmases, and singing Xmas carols in winter weather. In a 2005 interview, Williams discusses how The Andy Williams Show figured into his recording of the song, first introduced in the 1962 Xmas episode: "George Wyle, who is a vocal director, who wrote all of the choir stuff and all of the duets and trios and things that I did with all the guests, he wrote a song just for the show - I think the second Christmas show we did - called 'Most Wonderful Time of the Year'. So I did that, you know, every Christmas, and then other people started doing it. And then suddenly it's become - not suddenly but over 30 years - it's become a big standard. I think it's one of the top 10 Christmas songs of all time now." Although Williams recorded multiple other versions throughout his life, the original 1963 vers. remains the most popular and well-known. The song was selected as the theme song for Christmas Seals in 1968, 1976, 2009, and 2012.
#music #christmasmusic #piano
