Celebrate Christmas with these songs

Christmas is time for family, food and fun. What better way to celebrate this annual holiday than with a mixture of old and new Christmas songs.

Classics

• Joy to the World – This uplifting, much arranged favourite carol is set to a text by Isaac Watts (1674-1748), a paraphrase of Psalm 98. Take 6 included it on their Christmas medley and Whitney Houston gave it a nice soulful edge.
• Santa Claus is Coming to Town – First sung on Eddie Cantor’s radio show in November 1934, Santa Claus is Coming to Town was an immediate hit – with 100,000 orders for the music the next morning and 400,000 by Christmas. The earliest recordings are by banjo player Harry Reser (1934) and Tinkly George Hall and his orchestra. Nat King Cole came soon after and the Jackson 5 added their own unmistakable harmonies.
• Silent Night – The words were written by Joseph Mohr, an Austrian priest in the Alpine village of Oberndorf on Christmas Eve 1816. This is a favourite for female solo artists, from Mahalia Jackson to Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Beyoncé and Katherine Jenkins. The most soulful is arguably Sam Cooke and his Soul Stirrers.

Hip-Hop

• Christmas in Harlem – This song is by Kanye West featuring Big Sean, Pusha T. Produced by Hit-Boy, the six-minute 32-second track found each of the rappers giving a different take on the holidays.
• Ludacrismas – Ludacris created this jam as a soundtrack for the holiday film Fred Claus in 2007. In the song he raps “I tell ‘em all I want for Christmas is two gold front teeth.”
• Santa Claus Goes Straight to the Ghetto – In this song Snoop Dogg shows that Christmas wishes can come true.