Bing Crosby Christmas Recordings: Best CD Versions?*

I need to get this stuff for my grandma (she has an old Decca "Merry Christmas" LP) and I was wondering what the best CD versions are for this material. (I'm not looking for "Merry Christmas" specifically).

 

There is a 2-cd set of all Bing's Decca Christmas recordings (can't remember the title)-it is essential! Buy it!

 

Steve also mastered a Bing Crosby Christmas best of CD.

 

The Voice Of Christmas: The Complete Decca Christmas Songbook

Bing Crosby Sings Christmas Songs is the fifteen-track CD compiled and mastered by our host. IMO, the fourteen songs found on both collections honestly sound better with Steve's mastering. Bing Crosby Sings Christmas Songs and the Merry Christmas LP have eight songs in common, including the 1947 recording of "White Christmas"

Steve kindly shared some interesting details about mastering the CD on this thread.

 

I should have realized that. I'm seeing copies that were released in 1999. Are these different from the 1986 pressings?

 

For some reason they show up on eBay with a December 25, 1999 release date. The UPC of my disc is 07673257652. It has dual catalog numbers, MCAD-5765 and JVC-500.

 

One song which doesn't sound very good on the SH-mastered CD was "Adeste Fideles." But I cannot blame Steve for the sound quality bugaboos on that track; he simply took whatever MCA gave him to master (even if it's a crappy, midrangey-sounding tape dub of the metal parts).

On the other hand, both the budget-priced White Christmas CD (originally the Merry Christmas LP) and the aforementioned 2-CD Christmas comp sounded like they used a better source for many of the 78-era tracks (the 2-CD comp used some digital NR on the 78-era tracks). However, the 2-CD comp shoots itself in the foot by the (over)use of digital NR on some of the recordings which were originally done on tape (I noticed this especially on "It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas," which was recorded in October of 1951, where the version on the 2-CD comp and the current 20th Century Masters Christmas comp suffers from rolled-off top end and some flanging problems.) The SH-mastered version of that song, along with the one on the budget-priced White Christmas CD with no mastering credit, did not use digital NR on that track.

 

The "White Christmas" CD doesn't have the reverb that my beloved "Merry Christmas" LP is doused in, but it's a great collection, nonetheless. I also enjoy the 20th Century Masters Christmas Collection quite a bit. The 2-disc comp is good, but the sequencing is not. Three of the first seven tracks on disc 1 is "Silent Night."

 

i think the sequencing is strictly chronological, which in this case doesn't work too well. though, you can always program those out, i guess...

 

right, but if his grandma is like mine (she's not, since she's obviously still alive), then she's not one for programming CD's.

 

After opening with Happy Holiday, the sequencing is essentially chronological for the rest of the disc. Including, three songs (Silent Night master and alternate and Adeste Fideles) recorded in 1935 that had never been issued on a compilation before. In 1942 Bing re-recorded these two songs, along with the original version of White Christmas and God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen. He then re-recorded White Christmas and Silent Night in 1947 when the metal parts from the 1942 versions had deteriorated due to heavy demand. The 1947 versions are the versions most people know today. So yes, of the first twelve tracks on The Voice Of Christmas we get four versions of Silent Night, two of Adeste Fideles, and two versions of White Christmas. One of the drawbacks I suppose of issuing a complete label compilation like this. For the original poster... go with Steve's disc if you can find it. A nice companion CD is the circa 1960 Bing Crosby's Christmas Classics, originally released on Warner Brothers, now on Capitol and it's offshoot budget labels. There was one version released a few years back with bonus songs. Ron

 

What do you think of the sound on the White Christmas CD? I was listening to it this weekend and I have to admit, some of it's just painful.

 

Is there a book about Bing's christmas recordings somewhere? Where you do get all this fab information?

 

The 1942 "White Christmas" sounds very rough on "Voice of Christmas." A better 78 copy was located several years ago, and appears in its best sound on "Now That's What I Call Christmas." It was also used for "Very Best of Bing Crosby Christmas"/"Millennium Collection" (the same disc), but suffers from excessive noise reduction.

But the best I've ever heard the 1942 version sound is on the "Chronological Crosby" CD series issued by the International Crosby Circle, transferred from a beautiful 78. It's the only one that has no distortion in the vocal at all.

 

I just picked that one up Brian... what a lovely restoration job aye? Even Steve has mentioned that a quality needledrop is the only way to go sometimes... it's a shame that mint 78's from this era are so rare. Ron

To my friend Pawnmower... I read as much as I can about the things that interest me. There's several wonderful Crosby websites that include full session details.

 

The original vinyl LP was I Wish You a Merry Christmas (Warner Bros. W 1484 and SW 1484), released in 1962 with 14 songs, some of them combined as two-song medleys. A year later, Crosby went to Capitol and made the one-off single "Do You Hear What I Hear" and "Christmas Dinner Country Style" (Capitol 5088). His version of "Do You Hear..." was among the first. (The Harry Simeone Chorale also recorded it in 1963.)

In 1977, after Bing's death, the Warner Bros. LP was reissued by Capitol under the name Bing Crosby's Christmas Classics (Capitol SM-11732), but with only 12 of the 14 songs of the original. Capitol controlled the rights no later than 1973, as some Capitol Special Markets LP compilations from earlier in the 1970s (Christmas America, a Firestone album from 1973, and its 1974 followup, Christmas America Volume 2, come to mind immediately) contained Crosby recordings from the WB album without a licensing credit.

The most recent CD collection of this material restores the entire WB album, adds both sides of the single, and includes the "Peace on Earth/Little Drummer Boy" TV recording with David Bowie from 1977 and a recording of "White Christmas" done for a Frank Sinatra TV special in 1957 with a Nelson Riddle arrangement.

 

There are a couple of Laserlight compilations which feature Bing Crosby singing White Christmas in different versions than any of the Decca ones I've heard. I don't know whether they are from airchecks or not. No applause. The sound varies, but it's overall good, at least in my memory.

 

Yes.... from various 1940's Christmas Special radio broadcasts. The sound quality is surprisingly good and the performances are fine too. I like when he introduces The Christmas Song as a new one written by a couple of teenaged tunesmiths, Mel Torme and Bob Wells!

Thanks for the info Tim. I knew Pat-a-Pan and Christmas Dinner... didn't make it on the Capitol album. See folks, it wasn't just the Beatles who got short-changed by Capitol Any reason those particular tracks got released on a slew of budget-priced CEMA albums, cassettes and CDs through the years? Same question regarding White World Of Winter... a fun and festive song from 1964 that has been on several Various Artists compilation releases, but none of Bing's Christmas albums. Ron

 

"The White World of Winter" was a one-off single from 1964 on Reprise; it was never intended for an album, unless it was for one that was never completed. It has only appeared on some compilations over the years.

Bing had done some Christmas songs with Frank Sinatra and Fred Waring for Reprise, on an LP called 12 Songs of Christmas, released in 1963. AFAIK, though the Sinatra tracks and the Frank/Bing duets have been issued on CD, the Bing solo material has not, at least not in the U.S., except for perhaps his re-recording of "The Secret of Christmas." (The Columbia version, which he did for the movie Say One for Me in 1959, is definitely on CD.)

Capitol was known for using songs not on any of its artists' currently available albums on Christmas special-markets comps. Another example was with Nat King Cole. When The Magic of Christmas was reconfigured into The Christmas Song, the new title song was added and "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" was removed. Even though that song was AWOL from a Cole album until 1990, it appeared on at least a handful of special-markets LPs in the years before then.

Part of the problem with Bing's post-Decca material is that the rights are split among so many different labels. Crosby basically recorded freelance after his Decca contract expired. I'd love to see a comprehensive Christmas CD, similar to The Voice of Christmas, encompassing his post-1956 studio holiday recordings. But there are items he released that are under the umbrella of all four of today's majors, so unless someone like Shout Factory or Varese did it, it'll probably never happen.

 

I have:

• Steve's Bing Crosby Sings Christmas Songs (Thanks for this terrific collection Steve!)
• the Voice Of Christmas 2-CD set
• an MCA Special Products CD of That Christmas Feeling - with a single fold insert that just lists the tracks - without the original LP cover photo
• an original CD issue of Merry Christmas
• the remastered version of Bing Crosby's Christmas Classics

But I also have some questions:

1. Is the mastering on the newer CD incarnation named White Christmas different than the original Merry Christmas CD? If so, better or worse?
2. Is the mastering on the original CD issue of Bing Crosby's Christmas Classics CD (without the bonus tracks) better or worse than the re-master (with the bonus tracks) that was done by Bob Norberg?

Thanks!
Dexter

 

Thanks Tim!

As always, great information!

So the track listing on AMG is incorrect then. They list "Do You Hear What I Hear" as the first track on the WB album from 1962. Was "Pat-A-Pan/While Shepherds Watched Their Flock" on the original LP?

Dexter

 

I listened to both "Bing Crosby Sings Christmas Songs" with "Merry Christmas" tonight. I admit I did not attempt to do audiophile comparisons; just put them on while relaxing.

I'd certainly go for "Sings Christmas Songs" since Steve Hoffman mastered it. (Is it possible MCA simply took his dubs as a start for the "Merry Christmas" CD? If you like Bing as much as I do, you really want both anyway. There are songs like the sort-of Hawaiian Mele Kalikimaka, Silver Bells and some others on one disc and the other has a couple of beautiful medleys plus a nice in-company Christmas message which ends the disc.

 

Is this Steve's? :




If so, it isnt too hard to find right?

 

That's the one. It shouldn't be too hard to find. There are several copies at Amazon marketplace.

 

Thanks Claus !