Sixty-nine years ago today, on October 15, 1957, Elvis released his very first Christmas album. It was called, simply, “Elvis’ Christmas Album,” and it came wrapped in that famous red gatefold cover.
Fans loved it right away. It spent four weeks at No. 1 on Billboard’s pop albums chart.
But not everyone was celebrating.
One of the most famous songwriters in American history heard what Elvis had done with one of his beloved holiday classics, and he was furious. He called the young singer’s version a “profane parody” of his song. Then he did something about it.
He had his New York staff get on the phones and call radio stations all across the country, asking them to stop playing it.
Can you guess who he was?
Elvis singing the Christmas classic that started the whole fuss
Here’s the official recording of the song at the center of the storm. Press play, listen to that warm, easy voice, and decide for yourself whether it deserved all that anger.
The songwriter was Irving Berlin, and the song was “White Christmas,” one of the best-loved carols ever written. Berlin had poured his heart into it years before, and he did not care one bit for the loose, bluesy swing Elvis gave it.
Most American stations just shrugged and kept spinning the record. But up in Canada, most stations did refuse to play the album.
And here’s the detail that really gets people. At least one radio disc jockey reportedly lost his job over an Elvis Christmas record around that time. The story has been passed down for years, though the name has gotten fuzzy with the telling.
Think about that. A man possibly out of work, over Christmas music.
Berlin never did get his way. For all the phone calls and all the fuss, he could not get the record pulled. He tried, but he could not stop it.
In fact the album did the opposite of disappear. It climbed to the top and stayed there for a solid month, and Elvis fans still pull it out every December.
Sometimes the fight over a song tells you as much about its power as the song itself. Berlin was a giant of American music, and even he couldn’t keep the country from hearing Elvis sing about a white Christmas.
Go on and play it above. Nearly seventy years later, it still sounds like home.