Me? Hipster's Holiday or Jackson 5 Christmas ...

My insane Christmas revel involves a fanciful brainstorm: Get a handful of folks together to perform the Jackson 5 Christmas record next year... Well ... that's an inspiration - dim re-creation at best, perhaps ;-).

But it really is that transcendently good. It focuses everything that made Berry Gordy's Motown operation so successful on this sweet little slice of Christmas repertoire.

The record includes 11 pop Christmas Carols:

"Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" (Blane/Martin) – 5:19
"Santa Claus Is Coming to Town" (Coots/Gillespie) – 2:24
"The Christmas Song" (Torme/Wells) – 5:11
"Up on the Housetop" – 3:16
"Frosty the Snowman" (Nelson/Rollins) – 2:39
"The Little Drummer Boy" (Davis/Onorati/Simeone) – 3:15
"Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" (Marks) – 2:32
"Christmas Won't Be the Same This Year" (Sawyer/Ware) – 2:31
"Give Love on Christmas Day" (Gordy/Mizell/Perren/Richards) – 2:44
"Someday at Christmas" (Miller/Wells) – 2:44
"I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus" (Connors) – 3:01

The Album was released in 1970 ... two years after the riots of 1968.

Michael's 12 year old voice soars - outside of Louis Armstrong, his gospel intonations perhaps the first and most widely heard modulation of blues pathos upon the bland and schmaltzy mediocrity typical of the holiday genre. And we have to remember that the Jackson 5 and Motown represented the most revolutionary race/genre cross-over since Elvis in pop culture.

More musically significant are the stupendously inventive and bouyant arrangements and performances of Berry Gordy's *Corporation,* Gordy, himself, Freddie Perren, Deke Richards, and Alphonzo Mizell who were specifically behind the Jackson 5 sound. (Sorry if you believed the boys from Gary were actually responsible ...) So ... you listen to the record and you hear the echoes (and augury) of Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, The Supremes, The Four Tops, The Temptations, Martha and the Vandellas, The Spinners, Jimmy Ruffin, and Gladys Knight & the Pips ...

The sound and rhythms on these selections are just killer. "Give Love on Christmas Day," the only original on the record (later covered on a number of other Motown artist recordings including Stevie Wonder) is a wonderful lament of misguided Christmas cheer, and a plea to remember what's most important. So when I hear this, I get a huge charge out of Michael's outrageous performance. But it's also a landmark, like many in our cultural history, of music's power to transform social relations. (And what is Christmas, if not a time for transforming social relations ... preferably for the longer term?)

I am also reminded of the wonderful unsung artists behind some of the greatest cultural contributions in the country's history; and grateful thence, for the people here in our own church who render grace and awe through their repertoire, voices, hands and fingers every week, and especially during this most blessedly musical holiday season: Bob Griffith - Director of Music, Melodie Feather- Director of Handbells, Vera Tilson- Director of Music Emerita, Bea Ann Phillips - Director of the children's choir, and Bob Kline, accompanist for the youth - (no title, I guess, but irreplaceable, nevertheless!).

Can't wait to harmonize with you all later tonight!