MixBlog 12-27-10

Now that Christmas is over, we can look forward to the end of 2010. I thought about doing something on this blog this week, perhaps pointing out some of my favorite posts or something. Anyway, that will be for the week to come. I've got a few things to go through now...

Christmas Music: I just removed the holiday songs from my iPod. Here are my Top 5 Most-Played Christmas Songs:

Baby, It's Cold Outside - Glee Cast (16 plays)
Baseball Glove - Gord Bamford (13)
God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen - Annie Lennox (10)
Put A Little Love In Your Heart - Annie Lennox and Al Green (10)
We Need A Little Christmas - Glee Cast (9)

All of the songs from the new Annie Lennox and Glee albums were played at least 5 times.

Snow: We officially had 12.4 inches Sunday into this morning. The forecasts generally went like this: from nothing (Thursday) to a coating to an inch (Friday) to 6-12 inches (early Saturday) to 10-15 inches (later Saturday evening) to 5-10 inches (late Sunday afternoon). The development of this storm, we're told, was very tricky to forecast. (Aren't they all?) As it turned out, all day and much of the night Sunday, the heaviest bands of snow that were circling around the low pressure as it moved north along the coast were unable to push across the Delaware River and into Pennsylvania.

My Go-To Christmas Music

Before I get into my main lists, I want to share a new favorite I discovered on Todd Zolecki's Phillies blog at MLB.com. It's "Baseball Glove" by a Canadian country singer-songwriter, Gord Bamford. The lyrics talk about the many things the family wants, but all he wants is a baseball glove -- specifically, "a genuine cowhide Rawlings Pro Special, one autographed by Roy Halladay." Bamford is a Blue Jays fan and it was released last year, before Halladay was traded to the Phils, but it doesn't matter. Click the above link and you can watch the video and find a link to download the song for free.

There are so many new Christmas albums now, but in recent years I've only bought a few. These are the albums I bought in the last couple of years that I really enjoy:

Glee Cast - Glee: The Music, The Christmas Album (love the Chris Colfer/Darren Criss version of "Baby, It's Cold Outside")
Annie Lennox - A Christmas Cornucopia (I love what she did, but I kind of wish this had a couple of fun, not so serious/religious-oriented selections, like Eurythmics' "Winter Wonderland," one of my all-time faves)
Kristin Chenoweth - A Lovely Way To Spend Christmas
Barenaked Ladies - Barenaked for the Holidays (their quirky humor shines in a number of songs, especially "An Elf's Lament;" also includes a few Hanukkah songs)
Ella Fitzgerald - Ella Wishes You A Swinging Christmas

I also found a couple of CDs that had been released previously: "A Classic Cartoon Christmas" and "A Classic Cartoon Christmas, Too." They feature tracks from many classic TV shows (and some that aren't so classic). Between the two, they include "Welcome Christmas" and "You're A Mean One, Mr. Grinch" from "Dr. Seuss' How The Grinch Stole Christmas," songs from "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" and "Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town," Jimmy Durante's "Frosty the Snowman," a couple from the Muppets, and -- most happily -- the "Heat Miser" and "Snow Miser" songs from "The Year Without a Santa Claus." (I really need to edit them into one mp3 so when my music is in shuffle mode, I won't hear one and not the other right away.)

The following are the Christmas CDs I've had the longest, and are still my favorites: