Christmas Music

Luke Mundy's posts on Christmas Music have had me thinking a lot about Christmas music in general.

Christmas music is one of these two things:

1. Music about the true meaning of Christmas (the birth of Jesus)
2. Holiday music that is normally associated with the season

Christmas music can be one of these or both, but it is much easier to make new music from the first category. Of course almost every musical artist has done some rendition of a classic Christmas tune, which is relatively easy, but this isn't creating new music (in this situation).

I think when most people think of Christmas music they think of the second category, even though the specific songs might fit in the first category. If you were to write a song about the birth of Jesus that no one had heard before it would unlikely be considered a Christmas song by most people until it reached that degree of holiday association.

This makes it hard then to enter the Christmas music market. It is possible with such pop songs turned Christmas classics such as Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You" and The Beach Boys "Little Saint Nick", but very difficult.

So, I think my whole point is I wish all of you musicians out there the best of luck with creating new Christmas music, especially if it fits in the first category.