Perfect Candidates Week Fifteen

Sorry I'm late with these (as if anyone was actually waiting for them) but Mother's Day weekend was surprisingly hectic.

It only took a few months but I've finally come to the realization that all this work has been unnecessary. The perfect Christmas compilation only needs a few tracks each from a couple of Johnny Mathis albums and you're all set. It took great determination to hold myself to six Mathis tunes in this week's additions.

1. A Merry Christmas Song - Living Strings & Living Voices
2. Angels We Have Heard on High - The Roches
3. Blue Christmas - Johnny Mathis
4. Comfort And Joy - Simon & Garfunkel
5. Do You Hear What I Hear - Andy Williams
6. Do You Hear What I Hear - Johnny Mathis
7. Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas - The Going Thing
8. Here Comes Santa Claus - Doris Day
9. Mele Kalikimaka (Christmas in Hawaii) - KT Tunstall
10. My Christmas Tree - The Going Thing
11. My Favorite Things - Living Strings & Living Voices
12. Ring Christmas Bells - We Wish You A Merry Christmas - Living Strings & Living Voices
13. Sleigh Ride - Johnny Mathis
14. Sleigh Ride - KT Tunstall
15. The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire) - Johnny Mathis
16. The Jolly Old Man In the Bright Red Suit - Vaughn Monroe
17. The Sounds of Christmas - Johnny Mathis
18. Twas the Night Before Christmas - Fred Waring and his Pennsylvanians
19. Winter Wonderland - Johnny Mathis

Week 15 - Albums

Here are most of the albums I listened to, some more thoroughly than others naturally, while compiling this week's new additions to the master list. Song list to follow in a little while...

50,000,000 Santa Fans Can't Be Wrong! - The Dino Martinis
A Christmas Card - The Forester Sisters
A Christmas Carousel with Children's Bible Hour
A Christmas To Remember - The Jimmy Joyce Singers
A Family Christmas - John Tesh
A Sentimental Christmas - Gerry Beaudoin
A Sound of Christmas - Søren Sko
Brand New Year - Shedaisy
Cheetahlicious Christmas - Cheetah Girls
Chemistry Xmas - Girls Aloud
Chicago XXV - Chicago
Christmas - Kimberley Locke
Christmas - Tim Janis
Christmas 1968 With The Going Thing
Christmas Album - Johnny Mathis
Christmas At The Stables - Cleo Laine
Christmas Carousel - Peggy Lee
Christmas Classics - Burgess Meredith With Joe Reisman's Orchestra And Chorus
Christmas Disco Party - Max Fagen
Christmas Eve with Johnny Mathis
Christmas Favorites Sung By The Magnificent Magnavox Chorus
Christmas Is For You - Paulette Carlson
Christmas Is The Time - Lou Rawls
Christmas Pan Flute, Vol. 2
Christmas Time - The Pete King Chorale And Orchestra
Christmas With Kitty Wells
Christmas With The Chipmunks
Christmas in Europe
Christmas in My Heart - Connie Francis
Christmas with Paul Anka
For Christmas - Johnny Mathis
Give Me Your Love for Christmas - Johnny Mathis
Hallelujah He Is Born - Sawyer Brown
Have Yourself A Very KT Christmas - KT Tunstall
Home for the Holidays - Trisha Yearwood
It's Christmas Time
Jack Jones Christmas Album
Laughing All The Way - Kitty Stallings
Let It Snow - Michael Buble
Marshmallow World & Other Holiday Favorites - Raul Malo
Marty Gold Children's Chorus - How The Grinch Stole Christmas
Merry Christmas - Andy Williams
Merry Christmas - Johnny Mathis
Music Box Christmas creations - Porter Music Box
Music For A Merry Christmas - Frank Chacksfield
Noels - Paul Mauriat
Nutcracker Suite - Duke Ellington
Osmond Family Christmas
Peace - Rotary Connection
Rock-A-Billy Christmas
Santa's Playlist - Sister Hazel
Simply The Best Christmas Album
Songs of the Season - Peter White
Sounds Like Christmas - The December People
Sounds of The Season - Elliott Yamin
Sounds of the Season - Taylor Swift
Spirit of the Carols - Thom Rotella
Star Bright - Vanessa Williams
Swing Along With Santa's Snowmen
The Christmas Album - The CompanY
The Joyous Sounds of Christmas - Johnny Largo at the Optigan
The Meaning of Christmas - Fred Waring
The Sounds of Christmas - Johnny Mathis
The Williams Brothers Christmas Album
Watching The Snow - Michael Franks
Well Seasoned - The Joy Strings
When It Snows - The Blenders
White Christmas - Living Strings & Living Voices

Nine more drops...

Nine more tracks drop from the main lis. Some wonderful music here - The Glad Singers were over-represented on the master list and so are over-represented here. I must have done half a dozen A/B comparisons of the Sinatra and Jack Jones versions of Mistletoe and Holly and in the end I found Sinatra's a bit too somber for the flavor the Perfect Mix is beginning to develop.

A new group of nominees coming soon (and it won't be a short list this time thanks to my hitting the Johnny Mathis section of my collection!)

1. Deck the Halls - The Glad Singers
2. Happy New Year - The Glad Singers
3. Deck The Halls With Boughs Of Holly/Wassail Song - Hugo Winterhalter
4. Gee Whiz, It's Christmas - Carla Thomas
5. Gloria (Angels We Have Heard on High) - The Glad Singers
6. We Wish You A Merry Christmas - The Kingston Trio
7. Winter Wonderland - The Three Suns
8. The Little Drummer Boy - Henry Mancini
9. Mistletoe And Holly - Frank Sinatra

Perfect Candidates Week Fourteen

Here's a good sign - only two new additions to big list this week! And from a decent selection of albums too...

1. Good King Wenceslas - Mel Tormé
2. You Meet The Nicest People - Dinah Shore

Here are most of the albums I sampled this time out...

12 Saxophone Christmas Classics - Ace Cannon
60's Soul Christmas Party - Mark Baldwin
A Barbershop Christmas
A Caribbean Christmas - Tommy Beaumont
A Christmas Song - Russ Taff
A Drummer Boy's Christmas - Eric Darken
A Noteworthy Christmas
A Tapestry of Carols - Maddy Prior and the Carnival Band
Asi Es Nuestra Navidad - Gilberto Santa Rosa Y El Gran Combo
Christmas... It's a Love Story - Naturally 7
Christmas; Time For Song - Thurlow Spurr And The Spurrlows
Christmas Dreams - Liona Boyd
Christmas Memories = Barbra Streisand
Christmas Party - The Three Suns
Christmas Sing-Along with Mitch - Mitch Miller
Christmas Sing Song - Woody the Woodchuck
Christmas from around the World
Cool Jazz Christmas
Country Jul
December - Chris Botti
Faith of Our Fathers Christmas - John McCormack And Frank Patterson
Following Yonder Star - Scott Williamson
Funky Christmas
Gifts - Nashville Mandolin Ensemble
Greatest Christmas Songs of our Land - Vic Jordan
Guitars at Christmas - Guitars, Inc.
Holiday - Russ Freeman
Holiday For Teens - Paul and Paula
Home For Christmas - The Irish Tenors
In The Swing of Christmas - Brett Wales
Irish Tenors Christmas
It's Christmas Day - CBC TV's Singalong Jubilee Singers
It's Christmas Time In Holland
It's a Wonderful Life: Sax at the Movies for Christmas - Jazz at the Movies Band
Joyeux_Noel - Gisele_MacKenzie
Le Party Des Fêtes - La Famille Dion
Les Fans Chantent Noël - L'école Des Fans
Lil Wally Sings Polish Christmas Carols
Lynn_Anderson-The_Christmas_Album
Merry Christmas - Raymond LeFevre
Merry Christmas From Buck Owens & Susan Raye
Merry Christmas from Kukla, Fran and Ollie
Merry Monster Christmas
Mr. Hankey's Christmas Classics
Mrs. Santa Claus (OST)
Music And Mistletoe - Howard Lopez
My Christmas Favorites - John Davidson
Noël, parle-moi - Marie-Denise Pelletier
Noel! Noel! Noel! - Michala Petri
Noel - Derri Daugherty, Riki Michelle, Steve Hindalong
O Santa Where Art Thou
Pac-Man Christmas Album
Santa's Bag: An All-Star Jazzy Christmas
Sing Christmas and The Turn of The Year - Alan Lomax Collection
Sing Me Home - Lisa Leuschner
Songs Of Christmas - Alan Lomax Collection
The Season...A Family Christmas Celebration - Fred Penner
The Sounds Of Christmas - The Three Suns
The Three Suns Present Your Christmas Favorites
Tis The Season - Fred Koch
White Christmas - Rosemary Clooney

Perfect Candidates: Week Twelve

So, after the trauma of pulling 27 yracks off the master list here I am adding a bunch more righ back on it.

1. A Song And A Christmas Tree (The Twelve Days Of Christmas) - Andy Williams
2. Caroling Caroling - Lisa Ono
3. Frosty the Snowman/Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer - Henry Mancini
4. Give Love on Christmas Day - The Temptations
5. Jingle Bell Rock - Anita Kerr Singers
6. Jingle Bells/Sleigh Ride - Henry Mancini
7. Jingle Jangle - The Penguins
8. Let's Trim the Christmas Tree - Line Material
9. Medley: Pine Cones And Holly Berries (with It's Beginning To Look Like Christmas), We Wish You A Merry Christmas - The Living Voices
10. Merry Christmas Polka - Freddy Martin w. Merv Griffin
11. O Holy Night - Andy Williams
12. The Bell That Couldn't Jingle - Anita Kerr Singers
13. The Kinds of Christmas - Line Material
14. The Little Drummer Boy - Anita Kerr Singers
15. The Little Drummer Boy - The Living Voices
16. The Sounds Of Christmas - Catherine McKinnon
17. Winter Wonderland - Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass

27 more down...

I feel such a Grinch. 27 terrific songs cut from the master list. They'll all be back on one of the various supplemental playlists I'll work up once The Perfect is done - but still I feel as if I'm betraying some old friends...

1. 2000 Miles - Pretenders
2. A Five Pound Box of Money - Pearl Bailey
3. A Winter's Tale - Mike Batt & David Essex
4. Blue Christmas - Elvis Presley
5. Boogie Woogie Santa Claus - Lionel Hampton
6. Breath of Heaven - Amy Grant
7. Christmas - Rachelle Ferrell
8. Christmas Is The Best Of All - Johnny Tillotson
9. Christmas Love - The Rotary Connection
10. Come On, Ring Those Bells - Evie (Tornquist)
11. December Will Be Magic Again - Kate Bush
12. Deck The Halls - Sandler & Young
13. I Don't Intend To Spend Christmas Without You - Margo Guryan
14. I Love The Winter Weather - Tony Bennett
15. It's Clichéd to be Cynical at Xmas - Half Man Half Biscuit
16. Just Like Christmas - Low
17. Lo, How a Rose E're Blooming - Feist
18. Mary, Did You Know - Kathy Mattea
19. Merry Christmas Baby - Otis Redding
20. Merry Christmas Darling - Carpenters
21. Merry Merry Christmas Baby -Dodie Stevens
22. Midnight Sleighride - Sauter-Finegan Orch.
23. Ring out solstice bells - Jethro Tull
24. Silent Night - Elvis Presley
25. Sleigh Ride - The Ventures
26. Sleigh Ride - Voices of Walter Schumann
27. What Child Is This - Julie Andrews

Week 12 : Albums

In order to shorten some of these posts I'm going to experiment with using separate entries for each round of candidate's songs and source albums. Here are most of the albums I listened to in order to come up with the newest collection of candidates for TPXMASM...

A Christmas Sampler - Westminster Hi Fi
A Jazz-a-Bye Christmas
A King Family Christmas
A Million Dollars Worth Of Christmas Doo-Wop
A Sesame Street Christmas
Boas Festas - Lisa Ono
Can't Stop Thinking About Christmas - Universal Honey
Christmas Album - Catherine McKinnon
Christmas Dancing - James Last
Christmas Kisses
Christmas Time Is Here - Dianne Reeves
Christmas With Donald And Debbie - Donald O'Connor & Debbie Reyonlds
Christmas With The Don Les Harmonicats
Christmas with Korla Pandit
Doo Wop Christmas
Everything You Want For Christmas - Big Bad Voodoo Daddy
Gifts Of Comfort & Joy - Medwyn Goodall
Give Love at Christmas - The Temptations
Glade Jul - Sissel Kyrkjebø
Greatest Christmas Songs - Henry Mancini
Happy Holi-dee - Lenny Dee
Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas - Wayne King and His Orchestra
Irish Christmas - Craig Duncan
Joyeaux Noel - Les Djinns Singers
Laughing All The Way - Kitty Stallings
Merry From Lena - Lena Horne
Noel Des Anges - Laurence Jalbert
Pastorale des Noels de France - Le Petits Chanteurs de Chaillot
Pop Idols the Xmas Factor
Süßer Die Glocken Nie Klingen - Vicky Leandros
Snowfall - Jackie Gleason & His Orchestra
Spirit of Christmas - Medwyn Goodall
The Christmas Album - Mighty Blue Kings
The Little Drummer Boy - The Living Voices
The Magic Of Christmas - Giovanni
The Temptations Christmas Card - The Temptations
Too Many Santas! - The Bobs
Underground Oldies Christmas Album
When It Snows - The Blenders
Wonderland of Christmas - Andre Kostelanetz

I should have this week's songs up soon, plus I'll try to pull a few tunes off the master list in a feeble attempt to keep the tally under 200.