Nostalgia and Resilience: Why Christmas Music is my Favorite Genre

Few material possessions are more important to the Demski family than our Christmas CD collection. We add a new one each year to our large Rubbermaid container, we currently have 61. We then play them loudly through my dad’s nice speakers in our living room to christen them. This is how it has always been, and I don’t see it ending anytime soon.

We have everyone from Alvin and the Chipmunks to Hilary Duff to Boney James to John Denver to James Taylor. It was through these Christmas CDs that I was introduced to many classic musicians, ones that have now peppered their way through the rest of my musical taste. They were an easy introduction since I was able to sing along from the beginning. The box doesn’t simply represent one person in our family, it’s an amalgamation of all of us. We all work together to keep this tradition alive. My eldest brother contributed Devo’s Christmas album and Bootsy Collins’ Christmas is 4 Ever. My other brother gifted us Bob Dylan’s Christmas in the Heart from 2009. It’s mildly painful to listen to because Dylan’s voice is in rough shape, but we still love it anyways. I personally added the gem that is The Cheetah Girls’ Cheetah-licious Christmas which has acquired a few scratches from my repeated listening over the years. 

I’ve spent my whole life among these albums, many of which coincidentally came out around the year I was born. I thought this was normal, I thought that many of these go-to albums I knew and loved were also played in every home in America. Songs like “Ho, Ho, Ho and a Bottle of Rum” by Jimmy Buffett has been a staple in the Demski catalogue for as long as I could remember, but I’ve never met another person who has known this song by name. 

To start the Christmas season, my dad and I put up the tree on the day after Thanksgiving (a tradition we’ve had for as long as I could remember), and we always start out with Michael McDonald’s 2009 album, This Christmas. It isn’t on Spotify and it doesn’t look like it’s sold on Amazon, so our collection might actually be worth something one day. The album is bluesy and brash, in typical Doobie Brothers fashion. McDonald makes all of the songs his own by completely rearranging them. They have the familiar words, but before the lyrics come in, they’re unrecognizable. He makes them all larger than life with his booming (and sometimes unintelligible) voice.

From there we usually go to Luther Vandross’ This is Christmas. This album might be my definitive favorite, but then again, I love so many. It’s from 1995, and his voice is so beautifully smooth and eternal. I’ve always been obsessed with all of his originals, especially “Mistletoe Jam”. It’s kind of cheesy and starts off with a skit, but it’s one of those songs that can make me dance the second it starts playing. Few songs make me as happy as that one. The whole album is dreamy, and Vandross’ voice is incomparable. He also provides a lot of originals, one of which is with Darlene Love and it is to die for. I still remembered the way my heart broke after asking if he still did concerts and my dad telling me that he passed away a few years prior. 

Dwight Yoakam is next. He’s one of my dad’s favorite musicians and all of his other albums also appeared on road trips and our living room. Come on Christmas, was released the year I was born— 1997. His music is pretty heavy-duty country, I guess it could be considered ‘honky-tonk’. His voice is an acquired taste since it’s on the verge of yodel-y, but I’ve always loved it because of how unique it was. I always knew it was him, no one else sounds like Yoakam. The songs all have a country-tinge to them, but they sometimes verge into rock. He completely situates some beloved classics within a new setting.

Jimmy Buffett is next, his first album (which I like much better than his one released a few years ago) Christmas Island, released in 1996, is silly and lighthearted. I love that this album doesn’t take the holiday too seriously. I mean, that’s kind of Buffett’s whole brand— lightheartedness with an umbrella in your drink. He puts Santa alongside a different backdrop in the only way Buffett knows how, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Buffett commits to the bit that’s he’s built his career on, and I love it so much!

I guess the reason these four albums stick out to me so much is because they bring holidays into their world. They utilize their voices and curate classics and originals around their perspective, character, and their well-known genre. All of these albums feel very natural. I know that most musicians do Christmas albums because of how lucrative they are financially, but to me these all feel genuine. 

I love Christmas music with such a passion because there’s no other genre that encapsulates the same kind of emotion to me. These songs are choked full of nostalgia and tradition. They make me feel warm, reminding me of wrapping presents in our living room by our fireplace as we watch Elf on tv. They make me think of dancing around as my dad and I adorn the Christmas tree with our cherished ornaments. 

Christmas music has the ability to be modeled and morphed in a million different ways. Classic Christmas tunes are like the wax off of a Babybel cheese, all it needs is a little warmth from your hands, but it can easily be stretched to be anything: a little cube, a little person, a bowl. The classics have the potential to reach any genre and they’re the ultimate canvas. Cut-and-dry covers have been done to death, so when an artist gets weird, there’s nothing more invigorating (even if it’s not technically good, I appreciate the effort!)

I love that this season and these classic songs can transpire between genres and moods. That’s why Christmas music might be my favorite genre of music. It encapsulates everything that’s exciting to me about music and the power it holds. All of these songs that I revisit each year hold precious memories from my childhood as delicately as a parent snuggles their newborn baby. Christmas songs cover the spectrum of happy, joyous music, but also that of melancholy. I like there are spaces for all of these narratives. There will always be new music to discover in this boundless genre, and there will always be room in our Rubbermaid for more.