Customer Reviews

Rhythm & Blues Christmas

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This is certainly not your typical Christmas fare. Apparently, the rules for this compilation were that it had to be made of twenty tracks, all from company-owned material so that no licence fees would be payable. (Despite being a British label, Ace don't seem interested in following Jasmine and Proper by taking advantage of the British copyright rules.) Ace records having acquired a number of old record labels, the quantity would not be a problem, but what of the quality? In the event, the compiler found just about enough tracks that satisfied. Maybe there isn't enough material in the Ace vaults to compile a second volume of comparable quality, but that's life. Of course, I don't know what he left in the vaults, but I certainly approve of his selection. There are a variety of Christmas songs, some emphasizing the rhythm while others are more bluesy, but all fit comfortably within the album title.

Apart from B B King, the artists are mostly of the long-forgotten (except by their dedicated fans) variety, but this compilation is particularly interesting because, for the most part, the songs are as obscure as the artists. Yes, you'll recognize some (most notably White Christmas and Merry Christmas baby) but not many. Curiously, those two tracks both feature female singers (Hadda Brooks and Mari Jones respectively), although they are a rarity on this compilation. One other track (Gonna have a merry Christmas, by the Nic Nacs with Mickey Champion) features a female singer, but that's about it for the women here.

The opening B B King track (Christmas celebration) dates from 1962, while the following Smokey Wilson track (Christmas) dates from 1977. The two Lowell Fulsom tracks (I wanna spend Christmas with you, parts 1 and 2) date from 1967. The remaining tracks all date from the period 1948 to 1956.

There are so many excellent songs here that I'm not otherwise familiar with and it's difficult to pick out favorites. I borrowed it from a library, not sure what to expect, and reviewed that copy without time to figure out my favorite tracks, but I definitely plan to buy my own copy eventually. Despite the obscurity of these recordings, the quality is high. If you enjoy fifties R+B, buy this anyway and select your own favorite tracks.

When it comes to my music collection, which runs the gamut from Folk to Pop and Country/Rockabilly to R&B/Soul, one of my favourite genres running across that entire spectrum is that of Christmas-oriented tunes. And since one of my favourite distributors is Ace of London, how this one escaped my attention until now is amazing. I found it by accident while perusing through the reviews by old friend Peter Durward Harris of the U.K.

The Christmas single has been around almost since Edison invented the wax cylinder and although relatively few ever made any singles charts (the main reason being their air-time/juke-box lifetime being seasonal and therefore relatively short), the better ones do seem to appear every year in a multitude of compilations.

But if R&B is among your particular favourite genres, you won't find any anywhere else better than this great compilation which features all the attributes of any Ace product: great sound and informative detailed liner notes, in this case 11 by Herb Fenstein, as well as their usual listing on the reverse of the tracks showing label details and year of release.

What they don't show, as in most of their other releases, are chart positions, simply because only one among these did, in fact, make the charts, that being B.B. King's Chrisymas Celebration which made the Billboard Xmas Charts twice, # 25 in 1964 and # 17 in 1967. Many of these, however, pre-date those charts which didn't appear until 1963.

In addition to wonderful background information on the artists concerned, the booklet contains vintage photos of a young B.B. King, Lowell Fulson, Andrew "Smokey" Hogg, Oscar McLollie, Jesse Belvin and, on the outside back cover, a great shot of the gorgeous Hadda Brooks.

Well worth being added to any serious Christmas music collection.

With only BB King's Christmas Celebration being what might be considered "well known" this compilation of obscure and never before released Christmas songs is a fantastic addition to your festive playlist.