Vince Guaraldi Trio
“Christmas Time Is Here”
A Charlie Brown Christmas
Music by Vince Guaraldi; Lyrics by Lee Mendelson
1965 | Fantasy Records

It’s strange to find myself wishing for the triumph of uber-consumerism to help the economy, especially when unchecked capitalism in many of its incarnations is what got this country into financial dire straights in the first place, but here I am, albeit sheepishly, doing exactly that, especially once Black Friday officially kicked off the season. Perhaps this uncomfortable irony explains the greater than usual cultural significance of A Charlie Brown Christmas, even to a nice Jewish girl like me, with its counterleveling message of the import of spirituality and community over commercialism and greed, all graced, of course, by Charles Schulz’s humor. The opening track of the second side, “Christmas Time Is Here,” with music composed by jazz pianist Vince Guaraldi and lyrics by television producer Lee Mendelson, sets the more serious undertone, particularly in the last stanza with children’s voices singing “Christmas time is here / we’ll be drawing near / Oh that we could always see / such spirit through the year / such spirit through the year.” More somber than the other songs on this soundtrack scored by Guaraldi in 1965, it has just the right amount of Americana nostalgia without overdoing it to render it a classic, palatable to even the cynical. It’s also a beautiful melody, with a delicacy that matches Schulz’s underlying sensibility. Initially, CBS didn’t want to air the show and particularly disliked the music. They believed that it would be over the heads of younger audiences. Apparently not, since this project has proven to be one of the most successful of the 17 projects on which Guaraldi collaborated with Mendelson until Guaraldi died in 1973.

by Alicia Dreilinger