The selection of Vince Guaraldi to create the soundtrack for the primary A Charlie Brown Christmas Particular, which aired on CBS on December 9, 1965, happened by probability – and ended up proving to be an inspirational determination.
American tv producer Lee Mendelson, the person who produced the present, was in search of somebody to do a jazzy soundtrack. He initially tried for Dave Brubeck. “The first call I made was to Dave Brubeck, who was an old friend, but he was busy,” recalled Mendelson. “Years later he said he wished he hadn’t been busy!” Among the many names Brubeck recommended calling was Vince Guaraldi.
Hearken to the A Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack on Apple Music and Spotify.
An iconic work
San Francisco native Guaraldi first got here to note taking part in piano with Latin jazz vibraphonist Cal Tjader within the mid-50s. By 1960, Guaraldi was main his personal band and had even achieved successful on the pop charts with “Cast Your Fate To The Wind,” a tune which additionally received a Grammy.
But it surely was his mixture of requirements and authentic compositions for A Charlie Brown Christmas, carried out together with his jazz trio, that cemented his place in music and tv historical past. The soundtrack album went on to be a large bestseller, and its deft stability of sweetness and sorrow made it an iconic work in its personal proper. The success of the rating additionally helped make sure the lasting tv lifetime of a memorable present that includes the well-known characters Charlie Brown, Linus, Lucy, Sally, and Snoopy the canine.
Preliminary worries concerning the soundtrack
Issues didn’t look good at first of December 1965, nevertheless. After the soundtrack had been accomplished on the Whitney Recording Studios in Glendale, California, Mendelson took the tapes to the executives at CBS. “The two top people at CBS hated it,” recalled Mendelson. “They said it was too slow and too religious. I was devastated. They said, ‘We’ll have to run it because the showing is so close, but there won’t be any more shows.’ I thought we were doomed.”
The primary indications the CBS chiefs had been incorrect got here in a glowing assessment of Guaraldi’s music in Time journal. The present went on to win an Emmy and the music was acclaimed. It was launched by the Fantasy document label for the Christmas market and was quickly promoting out in document shops throughout the nation.
Why the music labored
“Vince Guaraldi’s music was crucial to the show’s success, because it was the first time a cartoon had used jazz, had used adult music, and that raised it a certain level,” stated Mendelson. The producer added that Charles M. Schulz, who created the unique caricature Peanuts, had additionally instructed him he thought the music had been “critical.”
Guaraldi’s tunes captured the contradictory feelings of pleasure and disappointment that many individuals expertise throughout Christmas. Whereas his songs fitted in brilliantly with the animation in a present directed by Invoice Melendez, they had been additionally magical items of music on their very own.
“I don’t think I’m a great piano player,” Guaraldi stated in 1958. “But I would like to be able to have people like me, to play pretty tunes, and to reach the audience.” He was in his 30s when he made his masterpiece album, working with two different gifted jazz gamers. The comb-drumming of Jerry Granelli provides to the document’s delicate energy, as does the nice and cozy double bass-playing of Fred Marshall – a person who had been the home bassist at San Francisco’s well-known jazz membership, Bop Metropolis, and who had performed with jazz legends Ben Webster, Joe Henderson, and Dexter Gordon.
Even the selection of visitor musicians was ingenious. Tom Harrell, the trumpeter on “Thanksgiving Theme,” performed on 5 Blue Observe albums with Horace Silver. The one musician with a hyperlink to England – Swindon-born drummer Colin Bailey – was the percussionist on “Greensleeves.” He went on to play on an iconic album with Frank Sinatra and Antônio Carlos Jobim.
The soundtrack
The A Charlie Brown Christmas album opens with “O Tannenbaum,” and although it could be a easy Christmas carol, Guaraldi’s improvisations gave it a fascinating freshness. Mendelson stated they’d no concept that Guaraldi’s music “Christmas Time Is Here” would evolve right into a festive traditional, however its nuanced shading makes it one of many least celebratory vacation requirements ever written. The irresistible “Linus And Lucy” has grow to be one of the immediately recognizable items of tv music from the twentieth Century.
In addition to taping classes in Glendale, Guaraldi re-recorded just a few songs at Fantasy Data Studios in San Francisco, utilizing a kids’s choir from St Paul’s Episcopal Church in close by San Rafael. The classes ran deep into the evening, with the kids rewarded with ice cream. They sing superbly on “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing.”
Guaraldi’s evocative rating, which is heart-warming and unusually bleak, struck a chord with the general public. When one of many CBS bosses realized that his preliminary opinion was misguided, one of the best he might muster to say to Mendelson was that “my aunt in New Jersey didn’t like it either.”
In August 2016, the Recording Trade Affiliation Of America licensed the A Charlie Brown Christmas album quadruple-platinum, for gross sales of 4 million copies. The soundtrack has been marked for everlasting preservation by the Library Of Congress.
Guaraldi went on to compose scores for 17 Peanuts tv specials, till his tragic loss of life, at simply 47, in 1976. They performed his fantastic Charlie Brown music at his funeral. Guaraldi left us all a Christmas traditional.
Vince Guaraldi Trio’s A Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack could be purchased right here.
