Jay Johnson is one of the co-creators of
Blue Christmas, and the story of how he came to write the song sounds
like it could have come straight out of the movies--but it's for real!.
Dean Kay has made that story available on
one of his web pages, with an excerpt from the book The Stories
Behind Country Music's All-Time Greatest 100 Songs.
Take a few minutes while you're listening to
Son of Revenge of the Blue Christmas and
Click Here for the entertaining story of one of the best-known
holiday songs of all time.
WHERE'S THE MUSIC?
IMEEM, the music source for this channel, has been acquired by
MySpaceMusic, which is migrating the music at this time (and it won't be
overnight, unfortunately). As soon as the transition is complete, things will be
back to normal on this Radio George channel.
If you haven't signed up to the free Radio George
Newsletter, use the link near the top of this page and you'll be notified when
this channel is available for listening again.
The Saga Continues...
If you haven't yet read how it all began,
you probably should
Click Here
to learn the backstory and then return to this page.
It was the morning of Saturday, September
19 of this year (2009). I was checking my email and the subject line
of the email--Revenge of the Blue Christmas--struck me as oddly
out of place and out of time. And what I read in that email just
floored me! Here's what it said:
Hi George:
Just ran across your "Revenge of the Blue Christmas" page on the
Net. I'm the guy who put together the Blue Christmas promo album
you used, when I worked for Lawrence Welk, who owned
the copyright at the time.
My association with the song ended when Welk got out of the
publishing business 19 years ago-- until August of this year when I
took over the the administration of the publishing rights, now
owned by the estate of one of the writers, Jay Johnson.
Harking back to the old days, and before knowing about your page,
I have added a lot of info about the song on my site:
What you've done is much cooler that what I've done.
I love your story about how you used the old promo package ...
That's what I was hoping would be one of the ways it might be
used. Glad I didn't destroy your career.
At any rate, thanks for helping keep Blue Christmas alive ... It's
a great Christmas song ... and they just aren't making them any
more.
All the best,
Dean Kay
President/CEO
Demi Music Corp.
4215 W Hood Av
Burbank, CA 91505-4015
Amazing! After more than twenty years, the
missing details appear as if by magic in my email. The power of the
Internet.
Thank you, Dean, for writing to provide me
and Radio George listeners all over the world with the story of the
album that started it all. And extra thanks for YOUR website,
preserving even more Blue Christmas history--and fun!
George Woods
Performers - Son of Return of the
Blue Christmas
Ballroom Dance
Orchestra
Kundera
Houston Person
Colinde Country
Laima
The Gentlemen
David Frizelle
Byron Lee & the
Dragons
Ricky Van Shelton
John Holt
Low
Copyright 2009 RadioGeorge LLC
All Rights Reserved
Blue Christmas Videos
See the
round button with thick double bars on the
player over there to the left ?
That's the pause button. Use it before you click on any of these videos, unless
you want to hear two clashing audio streams at the same time.
See the
round button with thick double bars on the