O Holy Night

My good friend H. (who has ditched the Midwest and is now living in San Diego) will be able to visit me on Christmas Day. This is amazing considering what I did to her last Christmas at the 2008 annual cookie bake. In my attempt to find the best ever version of O Holy Night, I downloaded numerous recordings. I knew that Johnny Mathis would be the measuring stick against which all other O Holy Night's would be measured. Johnny Mathis' O Holy Night is the O Holy Night of my childhood.

I started off with one requirement: It had to be in English. I want to sing along. really loud. As I started to look around, I saw some versions that were so weird I had to hear them even though I knew they would be horrible. My current O Holy Night collection consists of:

Aaron Neville
Al Green
Andy Williams
Bing Crosby
Carpenters
Christina Aguilera
David Phelps (who is this guy?)
Ella Fitzgerald
Gospel Choir of Louisiana
Harold Melvin
Irish Tenors
Johnny Mathis
Kenny Rogers
Lou Rawls
Luther Barnes
Mahalia Jackson
Mario Lanza
Nat King Cole
Neil Diamond
*NSYNC*
Perry Como
The Temptations

After listening to all that, I came up with some additional rules for O Holy Night:

1. "Fall on your knees" has to be sung as a stern command. If you warble during "fall on your knees" you are not a contender.
2. No children's choirs.
3. No backup singers during what should be solo parts.
4. A woman will probably never win this contest.
5. Slow down! O Holy Night should not be rushed.

H. and I tried to rank the top versions last year but we were too drunk from all the Christmas Ale to have sensible notes or conclusions. I know that she had an irrational attachment to Kenny Rogers and I was never willing to budge too far on Johnny Mathis. I think we had a Nat King Cole consensus.

I just had an email exchange with H. about her holiday travel plans. Now that her plane ticket has been purchased, I let her know I planned on adding to the O Holy Night collection.