Sounds of the Season with Vic Damone

As far as I know, the exceptional singer Vic Damone didn't produce a Christmas album until 1981, relatively late in his career. So I decided to fill the gap by assembling Damone's seasonal recordings from his early years with Mercury through to a group of 1965 LP cuts.

I have to confess that I have defined "seasonal recordings" broadly, taking my cue from my pal Ernie, who has (and shares) more Christmas recordings than anyone I know. (Please check out the holiday offerings from Ernie - and my good friend Lee as well.)

This means I included a few numbers that strictly speaking are not Christmas songs. They do, however, include "December," "Angels" or "Bells" in the title, and fit in well with the genuine holiday selections.

All told, the collection makes a attractive playlist of 13 songs derived from the holdings at Internet Archive and from my collection.

Below are a few words about each number, as usual presented in chronological order of issue.

Damone's career took off when he was still in his teens, and he signed with Mercury Records when he was just 19. It wasn't long before the label had him record his first holiday single - "Silent Night" and the Bach-Gounod "Ave Maria." The so-called "Mercury Chorale" simulates a heavenly choir and the young Damone sounds suitably angelic. Tutti Camarata conducted and presumably arranged.

Later in the year, Mercury had Vic try out two current tunes. One was "Spring in December," an Italian song by by Vittorio Mascheroni and Gian Carlo Testoni, with English lyrics from Harold Rome. The other was "The Serenade of the Bells" from Kay Twomey, Al Goodhart, and Al Urban. Glenn Osser conducted. Both are enjoyable songs that became hits, although not so much for the young Damone. His versions are well worth hearing though.

The Mercury Chorale return for our next selection, Franck's "Panis Angelicus," as conducted by Mitch Miller. This was an early 1948 recording presumably issued in time for Easter, although the hymn was actually written for the Feast of Corpus Christi. As always, Damone's singing is strikingly lovely.

For the 1948 holiday season, Mercury had Vic take a shot at "White Christmas," which he does very well, with the assistance of an anonymous orchestra and choir. The backing was a more unusual selection, "Christmas Morn," by Hilliard, Lehman and Travers. Hilliard is presumably Bob Hilliard; not sure of the other two, but this may be a reworking of an older composition. It's an interesting song (Billboard proclaimed it as "not as bad as these things usually are") and Damone does it well, if a trifle cautiously. (It isn't easy to sing.) He sounds more like Bing than usual on this record - or more to the point, Bing's disciple Perry Como, who gave Vic his first break.

FYI - Mercury packaged three of the songs above with seasonal specialties from Frankie Laine and Eddy Howard for an LP you can find here.

Jumping ahead to 1950, the label had Vic do a version of one of the new Christmas songs for that year, "It's a Marshmallow World" from Carl Sigman and Peter DeRose. It's a jolly tune attempted by many of the bards of the time. The most popular version was from Crosby, but my favorite is by Johnny Desmond.

"Music of the Angels," also from 1950, is "Blues in the Night" in a a less cynical, more pious vein, with the accompaniment of a simulated heavenly host. The bandleader was George Siravo, called "Sirabo" on the label. (Mercury had a talent for this: it identified Ralph Marterie as "Ralph Martiere" on the "Marshmallow World" label and Glenn Osser as "Glen" Osser on "Spring in December.")

I don't have anything else for you until Damone's move to Columbia records in the mid-50s. In 1956, Vic was Young Scrooge in the televised production of The Stingiest Man in Town, with a score by Fred Spielman and Janice Torre. I posted the Columbia cast album of this musical back in 2011, and it's still available. Damone's two numbers are soaring operetta-style arias shared with the excellent Patrice Munsel, but neither have any seasonal flavor.

The following year, there was a televised musical adaptation of Junior Miss, which is set at Christmas. The Burton Lane-Dorothy Fields songs only rated an EP of cover versions by Columbia artists, with Damone handling the title song (which has no holiday content). I posted the EP many years ago; it is still available here.

In 1957, Damone produced another bell song - "The Legend of the Bells," with the ubiquitous celestial choir accompanying a supernatural tale of chimes and a mission. It's a nice if contrived outing that Vic makes great. The credits are "Vic Damone with Marty Manning," who must have been busy singing all the choral parts and playing all the instruments.

We again jump ahead, to 1965 when Damone recorded three Christmas songs. Two - "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear" and "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" - were for a high quality album put out by the Firestone Tire Co., one of a series in the 1960s. The latter number is a brilliant Martin and Blane song written for Judy Garland and the 1945 film Meet Me in St. Louis. Damone is superb in both. Irwin Kostal, who won an Oscar for scoring The Sound of Music film adaptation that same year, arranges and conducts.

Our final selection is taken from the 1965 television show The Dangerous Christmas of Red Riding Hood, which starred Liza Minnelli as the title character, Cyril Ritchard as the Wolf and Damone as a Woodsman, the good guy in this tale. You can see all of them on the cover above, along with The Animals peeking out on the right.

"We Wish the World a Happy Yule" provides a brief coda to the proceedings. Most of the number is done by Minnelli, sounding like a combination of Shirley Bassey and Barbra Streisand, an unusual approach for Red Riding Hood, I'd say. Damone does get to sing a stanza and Ritchard makes a token appearance. It's pleasing tune by Jule Styne and Bob Merrill. Too bad it's not longer.

It's also too bad I don't have more Damone to share with you, but what's here is good! Hope you enjoy the songs and the holidays.

Addendum - Ernie has come up with a few more Damone holiday songs for us to enjoy. Please see his group of comments right below my first comment. His second link is the one that works. (It superseded his first link.) Thanks, pal!