There were plenty of reasons Vince Guaraldi’s soundtrack to ‘A Charlie Brown Christmas’ shouldn’t have worked. Jazz music for an animated television special featuring the famous comic strip characters? Yet the show has become a holiday tradition from its first airing in 1965, the music performed by Guaraldi’s piano-led jazz trio even more so. What unites Prince, Michelle Obama and Foo Fighters? They all performed the soundtrack’s “Linus and Lucy” in public. Members of show producer Lee Mendelson’s family wish they had the envelope where he hurriedly wrote lyrics to the song “Christmas Time is Here.”
By DAVID BAUDER (AP Entertainment Writer)
— The Mendelson family would love to find the envelope where their father, Lee, scribbled some lyrics to jazz musician Vince Guaraldi’s composition “Christmas Time is Here” for an animated TV special featuring the “Peanuts” gang in 1965.
The producer always said it had taken less than half an hour to write, and he likely tossed the scrap of paper away. He was in a rush. Everything was rushed. No one even knew, once the special aired, whether it would ever be seen again.
Instead, “A Charlie Brown Christmas” became an indelible holiday tradition and so, too, has Guaraldi’s music — perhaps even more so.
“Christmas just doesn’t feel like Christmas without hearing that album in the background,” said Derrick Bang, author of the biography “Vince Guaraldi at the Piano.”
The special itself was a bit of an oddity: a cartoon story of the meaning of Christmas soundtracked by a sophisticated, mostly instrumental jazz trio of piano, bass and drum.
Yet it worked. Guaraldi’s cascading piano evokes both motion and lightly falling snow on “Skating.” The driving melody of “Linus and Lucy” is the eternal backdrop to a swinging party. “O Tannenbaum” shifts from the traditional carol to a bass-driven groove. A children’s choir adds charm to “Christmas Time is Here.”
The soundtrack has sold more than five million copies. Its nostalgia-fueled popularity has only grown, getting a crucial boost in 1998 when Starbucks began selling it in stores, and fed steadily by new products. The latest, a box set of outtakes from Guaraldi’s recording sessions, was released this year.
“A Charlie Brown Christmas” has aired every year since 1965, although that tradition is about to change.
The special’s run on broadcast television ends this year. Apple TV+ bought the rights, and will stream it exclusively starting next year.
