White Christmas
Perhaps no other voice signals the beginning of the Christmas season like that of Bing Crosby. In fact, many people think that Christmas just isn’t Christmas until they have heard Crosby sing “White Christmas.” In a very sincere and simple manner, this carol seems to say more with fewer words than anything ever written about holidays in America.
Crosby was raised in a Christian environment and was a religious man. Not only did he know most of the familiar Christmas carols by heart, he had been singing them since his youth. In the midst of the Great Depression, Crosby was singing with the Guardsmen Quartet, and his rendition of “Silent Night, Holy Night” surprised everyone, topping out at number seven on the hit parade charts. Over the next few years, the single sold more than ten million copies. His success also meant that the world’s very best songwriters were beating a path to Crosby’s door. One of those who would come to pen a lot of Crosby hits was a man named Irving Berlin. If Crosby was the nation’s premier singer, then Berlin was his composing counterpart.
Born as Israel Baline in Mohilev, Russia, Berlin spent his youth in New York City. In 1911, while working as a waiter and pitching tunes on the famed Tin Pan Alley, Berlin wrote “Alexander’s Ragtime Band.” Thanks to that song, Berlin suddenly found himself, at the age of 23, in the spotlight. With talent, drive, and ambition, he stayed in the public’s eye for the next eight decades. You probably have no idea how many Irving Berlin songs you know while being unaware who wrote it, such as “God Bless America” and “There’s No Business Like Show Business.”
Berlin’s legendary status was sealed in 1941 when he was asked to score a motion picture that starred Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire. The film, “Holiday Inn,” was typical of a Hollywood musical: a hero wanting to live a dream faces failure time and time again, and while searching for success, he falls in and out of love. Yadda, yadda, yadda. The plot had been used on countless occasions in movies and Broadway, but this film’s hook was unique in that the musical score and storyline tied it to the holidays. Berlin’s genius became evident again as he drew on his own experience and observations. As was his hallmark, Berlin composed easy-to-remember lyrics and melodies that went straight to the heart.
As a New Yorker, when he thought of the Christmas season, he pictured snow and Santa. Yet as he spent many holiday seasons working in Los Angeles, he was well aware that for many, what made the atmosphere of Christmas special was more of a nostalgic dream than a reality: across America, everyone wanted that perfect white day when “treetops glisten” and children anxiously await Santa’s arrival. Everyone knew that the only Southern California location where it was ever going to snow was on a Hollywood sound stage. Starting with that as an anchor, he wrote what was to become the pivotal song for “Holiday Inn”—the song that would make the movie a classic.
But when he finished the song, Berlin was not sold on the effort. He even thought about tearing the piece up and starting over. But before he did, the disappointed writer took the time to sing it to Bing Crosby. Crosby loved it and convinced Berlin not to thange anything about the tune he called “White Christmas.”
Crosby first sang the song on his December 25, 1941 radio show. Perhaps because it was a sober Christmas, just three weeks after the United States had been forced to enter World War II, the performance generated instant response. Driven by both the movie and family separations caused by the war—thousands of soldiers were far from home, longing for the familiar sights and sounds of the holidays—the song topped the charts for twelve weeks, and the tune about which Irving Berlin had such misgivings would go on to win the Academy Award for best song of 1942. And over the next twenty years, Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas” landed on the charts fifteen more times. The song’s incredible sales alone indicated that, of all the modern Christmas songs, “White Christmas” simply and eloquently best voices the Christmas dreams and wishes of most Americans. No matter where we are, we want to see snow on Christmas Day. For at least a few hours, we want our Christmas to look like a greeting card.
Bing Crosby died in 1977. Just before his death, he filmed a television special that was to air during the Christmas season. With his family around him, the man whose voice had for so long been tied to the beginning of the holidays sang “White Christmas” for the last time. There could not have been a better way for the singer— who charted more than 350 times—to say farewell.
As long as children press their faces to the window looking for Santa, families make plans to get together for holiday dinners, and folks dream of snow on Christmas Day, there will always be a place for Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas.”
(Excerpts from “Stories Behind the Best-Loved Songs of Christmas” by Ace Collins)
