A habit has developed here, in which we highlight a classic holiday album as we approach that most wonderful time of year. One such album that has become a staple at the JP household is from the 1965 CBS Television special, “A Charlie Brown Christmas”. It may be unique among Christmas music collections in the way it came about. And it is definitely unique in its blend of jazz and the traditional, both things that have enduring appeal.

In 1965, everyone knew Charlie Brown and Charles Schulz’ “Peanuts” comic strip from which he came. Schulz’ strip went into syndication in 1950, and by its second decade had become one of the most popular comic strips in the nation. Oh wait – does everyone remember comic strips? That appeared in daily newspapers? On an entire page devoted to them? Yes boys and girls, that was a long time ago. But I digress.

For pretty much the entire time “Peanuts” was building an audience, a young San Francisco musician was toiling away, learning his craft and eking out a living. Vince Guaraldi was a 23-year-old jazz piano player in late 1951 when he was first in a recording studio with Cal Tjader’s Mambo Trio. Guaraldi put together his own trio in 1954 which played for mostly local, small, San Francisco venues. Other than a bit of exposure with the Woody Herman band in the late 1950’s, Guaraldi finished out the 1950’s with far less success than Charles Schulz had managed with his comic strip.

Guaraldi’s lucky break came when some DJs took a liking to the B-side of a single from a 1962 bossa nova album called “Jazz Impressions of Black Orpheus”. “Cast Your Fate To The Wind” got a lot of air play that year, reaching No. 22 on Billboard’s Hot 100 (and No. 9 on the Easy Listening chart). Two good things came from that record – a 1963 Grammy award for Best Original Jazz Composition, and that a television producer named Lee Mendelson heard and liked the song as he drove across the Golden Gate Bridge one day.

Mendelson was, at the time, searching for music to accompany a planned documentary on Schulz’s hit comic strip, to be called “A Boy Named Charlie Brown”. Mendelson pitched the project and Guaraldi was enthusiastic. When Guaraldi played “Linus and Lucy”, Mendelson thought it captured perfectly the mood he sought. Along the way, the documentary project ground to a halt for lack of financing (although a sound track album was released in late 1964), but a second project came down the road in 1965 – a Peanuts Christmas special. Mendelson collared Guaraldi again, who adapted much of his work from the earlier project, and added some new compositions.

The Christmas album, like the entire Charlie Brown Christmas project, is a curious mix of jazz and tradition. Some songs have nothing to do with Christmas (beyond their association with A Charlie Brown Christmas), some are traditional carols, and some are more modern holiday tunes (like Mel Torme’s Christmas Song, which more people know by the opening line “chestnuts roasting on an open fire”).

Then there are versions of traditional carols that are both good jazz and yet respectful of the spirit of the music.

The album is not a strict twin of the show’s sound track, with some songs included in each that are not in the other. There were multiple recording sessions (for both projects) that ran from March, 1965 through the fall of that year. There is some mystery about the other members of the trio, but they are believed to have been Fred Marshall (base) and Jerry Granelli (drums), at least on the Christmas album, for which some of the pieces were re-recorded.

A couple of the tracks featured the childrens’ choir from St. Paul Episcopal Church in San Rafeal, California. Mendelson recalls being at odds with the choir director when he chose takes that were slightly out-of-tune, which he felt emphasized the authentic singing of childhood. This track, “Christmas Time Is Here” was originally written as an instrumental. it was Mendelson who quickly added some lyrics for the show, completing what has become a classic.

The album was released on the heels of the television special, which first aired in December of 1965. The show was a surprise hit – although that should not be a surprise because of how big the Peanuts aura was at the time. Interestingly, the album didn’t get much traction. I very much remember the show at its debut (and annual airing thereafter) but was never aware that a record had been released. Interestingly, as time passed, Shulz’s Peanuts popularity and influence slowly ebbed, but “A Charlie Brown Christmas” continued to endure. By the late 1980’s, the Christmas Album was getting a second (or perhaps a first) wind. This is probably because of a lot of people in my age bracket who had loved the show but never realized there was an album until it got a wide release on CD. However it happened, “A Charlie Brown Christmas” has become one of the most durable of holiday albums.

I have not been shy in my disparagement of what pass for modern Christmas songs. It is my current belief that “Christmastime Is Here” might be the most recent of the really great Christmas songs. Is this verdict colored by my age and musical tastes? Absolutely, but if we exclude Christmas songs from the rock era (which are almost uniformly awful) this is one of the last to have earned its spot. This instrumental version is one of the loveliest holiday tunes I can think of.

We are a scant two years from hitting the 60th anniversary of the debut of “A Charlie Brown Christmas”, both as a television special and as a holiday album. This album took awhile to build some recognition in its own right, but it eventually did. And aren’t we all better off because of it?