Christmas Album

by Herb Alpert, Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass

Overview

Herb Alpert turned to jazz's Shorty Rogers -- then toiling in the L.A. film and TV studios -- for voice and string arrangements on his Christmas album, and Rogers in turn went all out for schmaltz. Rogers' cooing voices introduce several of the tunes, whereupon the Tijuana Brass do their mostly unrelated Ameriachi thing familiar from past albums. Indeed, "Las Mananitas" seems to have been lifted from an obscure B-side of a 45 and overdubbed with the Rogers treatment. Jingling bells is a recurring song theme -- first with "Jingle Bells," then the cloying "The Bell That Couldn't Jingle," and ultimately "Jingle Bell Rock." For the first time in a long time, Alpert's sense of pacing occasionally goes awry; "My Favorite Things" nearly comes apart in the silences and piano/vocal interlude between the TJB grooves, and "Sleigh Ride" screeches to a dead halt. And yet time and further exposure has revealed this record's homey charms, which no doubt is one reason why it continues to be available on CD where other TJB best-sellers have fallen by the wayside. ~ Richard S. Ginell

Product Details

Release Date:	10/23/2015
Label:	HERB ALPERT PRESENTS
UPC:	0814647020129

Tracks

1. Winter Wonderland
2. Jingle Bells
3. My Favourite Things
4. The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire)
5. Las Ma¿¿anitas
6. Sleigh Ride
7. The Bell That Couldn't Jingle
8. Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow
9. Jingle Bell Rock
10. Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring

Album Credits

Performance Credits

Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass   Primary Artist
Herb Alpert   Primary Artist

Technical Credits

Herb Alpert   Composer,Arranger
Burt Bacharach   Composer
Mitchell Parish   Composer
Mel Torme   Composer
Jule Styne   Composer
James Pierpont   Composer
John Pisano   Composer,Arranger
Johann Sebastian Bach   Composer
Shorty Rogers   Composer,Arranger
Jule Stein   Composer
Traditional   Composer
Joe Beal   Composer
Leroy Anderson   Composer
Felix Bernard   Composer
Oscar Hammerstein II   Composer
Richard Rodgers   Composer
Joseph Carleton Beal   Composer
Julius Wechter   Arranger,Composer
Public Domain   Composer
Dick Smith   Composer
Sammy Cahn   Composer
Robert Wells   Composer
Jim Boothe   Composer
Larry Kusik   Composer