You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - 7 (Barely) Bear-able Holiday Tunes

Episode Date: November 29, 2019

The holiday season has begun, so Peter and Adam list their favorite (or just the least-terrible) holiday tunes.7 Bearable Holiday Tunes"The Christmas Song""In the Bleak Midwinter""Christmas Time Is Here""Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas""Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!""I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm""Amazing Grace"BONUSThis episode of You'll Hear It is sponsored by Anytune. If you want to improve your jazz playing and transcription skills, Anytune is the #1 tool you need. Just load any track you want into the app, and Anytune allows you to change the speed, loop sections, change the pitch to a different key, and so much more. For more information, go to https://anytune.us/youllhearit/Want every Open Studio course for free? That's right - over 300 hours and 1200 lessons can be yours with free lifetime access! All you have to do is enter Open Studio's 2019 Holiday Giveaway. Go to https://learn.openstudiojazz.com/giveaway/, or watch this video of Peter for more info: https://youtu.be/KsdhVXE5ovILike those You'll Hear It shirts Peter shows off on the podcast? Want some YHI swag of your own? Take a visit to our store! Just go to https://teespring.com/stores/open-studioLet us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel.Interested in more jazz advice? Go here to browse our catalog of jazz lessons and courses available for purchase.Follow us on Facebook, Twitter & Instagram at:https://www.facebook.com/heyopenstudiohttps://twitter.com/heyopenstudiohttps://www.instagram.com/heyopenstudio See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Boom, boom, boom, boom, bum, bo, dao, shab, do dao shab do dow. Oh, what's up? It begins. Oh, it's about to jump. Oh, yeah. I'm Adam Manus. And I'm Peter Martin. You're listening to the You'll Hear It podcast.

Daily Jazz advice. Coming at you. Coming at you today. We are coming at you. Did we just lose some listening in all that intro? Full on holiday spirit. This cat came out with straight up like peanuts, Christmas. Well, I mean, you know,

I'm trying to jazz it up. We have a funny thing with our, what we call our cold open. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sometimes it's freezing cold like that one. We always have this moment where we kind of look at each other like, are we going to leave that? And we usually leave it. We always leave it. Always leave it. Never is good. Well, sometimes we say politically

incorrect things, and we still leave it as well. But no, why was I snapped my fingers and singing them holiday rhymes? Well, we had here in America, we had Thanksgiving yesterday. So, today, is the Friday after Thanksgiving, we can officially play holiday tunes.

Right, although Christmas trees and holiday sales have been up for like the last three weeks since Halloween pretty much. I know. A lot of people start very early, but we thought we would coach you through some options. I mean, listen, there's no surprises on this list. Let's be honest. There's not a lot of holiday tunes. There's not a lot of holiday tunes.

Good ones. There's a lot of holidays. I actually think some of these aren't even Christmas tunes. And the fact that you say barely, that's why we call this the seven bearable holiday Tunes. Very funny. Some of these can be played in an unbearable way, too. You know what I'm saying? Absolutely. Before we get to that, we're going to talk about our

sponsor, which we are so excited. The feedback is so fun when you get to sponsor something that it's like we're giving a little holiday gift to you. That we know it's right up our listeners out. Yeah, the product is so good. Of course the feedback. Yeah. And so this is AnyTune. And the

thing about this, you know, this is how you're going to use this app. You know, because it's a little bit hard to explain. So I'm just going to tell you how you would use it. You download it. You can get the free version if you're that if you're that kind of holiday cheap skate. That's fine. No, you can start there but you're going to want to go pro, very reasonably priced. But you can

start free. Let's say that you're under a little pressure. You got a little Christmas gig coming up because we are in the season and you haven't learned some songs. This is going to let you optimize your practice time. Because you're going to load in your favorite version. Maybe a little Ella Fitzgerald,

maybe a little Charlie Brown Christmas, wherever you need to to learn your song, you're going to load it into any tune. You're going to take your iPhone, your Android, your Mac, or your iPad over to the instrument that you are playing, and you are going to have all the tools available to learn very quickly, to develop your ears, to learn the repertoire that you need to do, to transcribe the music. It's going to be a joy. You're going to be excited and invigorated to practice again with this fun tool, any tune.

And it's not going to get in the way of you practicing. We were talking about this the other day. Some of these tools, like, they keep you away from your instrument. This gets you to your instrument, optimizes your tool. time. Great tool. AnyTune. You know, we don't endorse a lot of these. We never have, actually. No, we never have. We never have. So we're excited. Anytune, go to anytune.com. You'll hear it. Done. And then that'll send you what you can see about the different options, but you go right to the app store and then you're doing it. Yeah, as much as we preach listening, as much as we preach

transcribing, any tune is the perfect tool for that. So go pick yours up. I use it all the time. It's a listening tool. It's terrific. It's a listening tool. All right. So here's our list of seven barely bearable holiday tunes. Andrew, I'm officially changing the title to barely bearable. One of them's got to be spelled like the bear or the winter bear of course. Berenstine bears. Barren Stern.

I don't know what it is. So number one. Number one is not listen. It's listening to this song. No, number one is the Christmas song. Also known as Chestnut's roasting because of the first. Now this is beyond a bad. This is a great tune. It's a great tune. It's a great tune.

It's just done badly a lot. Neck and Cole's version is unbelievable. That's not one of the bad ones. That was easy to bear. Oh, good. The thing about it being done badly is funny because it's kind of a difficult tune. So what happens is if, like, you don't really know it. Yeah, it's vocally difficult.

It's got a lot of changes. But it's just, it's popular, but it's deep and it's good. And we really should end the list here, to be honest. But, well, I guess we got to do six more. All right, so favorite versions of this. Nack and colds, Nack and cold. Easily my favorite.

Yeah, yeah. I love Diam Rees version. A little bit self-serving because I did produce the record. Yeah. So every time someone listens, I get 0,000,000, zero zero zero zero zero zero one sense sorry was that too many zero no it was right um no that's a good one that sounds right that's about uh elephant's jr i mean so many

but knack and coal i mean that's what says christmas like that the string arranging i just thought of a bonus oh nice okay okay number two is in the bleak midwinter this is a a poem this is a melody written by gustav holz it is an unbelievable folk song it is very somber composer of the planets yeah It is just so beautiful. I play this in my trio. We do this in a very, like... In your frio?

In my frio. Oh, trio. I thought you said frio. I was like, is that what you call it in the winter? Yeah. The friezo. No, actually, we'll probably play this tonight because it's that time of year.

You have a gig on Black Friday? Yeah, man. I just love this tune. I love the melody. My favorite version is actually on a pop record. Sean Colvin. Great. Yeah, Sean Colvin.

She did some wonderful, Christmasy, holiday, unusual songs. Yeah, this is on that album she made for a, for it was like a winter album or something like that. Yes. Yeah, exactly. But this is on that and it is just so gorgeous. Awesome. Number three, Christmas time is here.

Classic. This is a great one. So this is written by Vince Guraldi, right? I believe so. I believe so. I think lyrics by someone else. Yeah. And of course is sort of the most recognizable and iconic of the Charlie Brown Christmas special. You know, I know I grew up

listening and watching it on ABC. You're probably watching on Netflix or something when you were a little boy because you're a little younger. Kind of a millennial guy. Yeah, Netflix for sure. Yeah, yeah. Did you ever get the Netflix DVDs in the mail? Yeah, man, early 2000s.

Oh, that was my jam. So inconvenient. Yes. So modern. I love it. You would actually put it in a mailbox, like a DVD. It was crazy. And it was like two bucks.

I'm like, how could they mail it to you? And then you mail it? That was a loss. But you remember when you get your mail and you have your Netflix in there? Yeah. Oh, great. I can watch a movie this week. I love how like...

But it was still more convenient than going to Blockbuster. It's true, it was. I was just looking to see yeah, Vince Girole. I love how we said that this is probably my favorite on here out of all these

and we talked about Netflix and Blockbuster the whole time. No, it's a great tune. Yeah, I mean, there's not a lot to say it's great. The OG version. And I love, they've got the vocal version with the little kids

and then they got just the instrumental version of stuff. Number four. Number four is have yourself a merry little Christmas. I will, thank you. Made famous by Judy Garland from the movie Meet Me in St. Louis. Also known as Meet Me in St. Louis.

No one here ever says that. No one ever says that. Great version, actually, by Hamilton's Leslie Odom Jr. Yes. That's popping right now. That's very good. I remember you hear that in the airport somewhere. I was like, wait, I like that.

Yeah, no, there's like a... There's like a... It's really nice. Alexander Hamilton. No, no, they don't go that deep. Because I'm Alexander Hamilton. What? Okay, yeah.

Number five. Now, number five is one that you put on here, and this is unbearable for me, but if you can bear it. We're talking about that one, right? Oh, my gosh, my eyes are rolling in the back of my head. That's a swinger. Whenever anybody calls this in the key of C. I'm out. You got to have a slick arrangement on it, though.

Yeah, because if you don't, it's a terrible tune. I can't leave this made our list. Well, we're at number five, man. We started with the Christmas song, man. It's a slippery slope. Hold on a second, Pete. What is our bonus? Well, don't say anything.

I know you think I'm doubling up here, but I'm not. We're going to get to that. We'll jump off this, let it snow because you're a little bit darker. No problem. What's number six? Number six is much superior to let it snow. It's in the same era. It's, I've got my love to keep me warm.

I don't know this one, do it? You don't know, the snow is snowing. The wind is blowing. You don't know that? No. I grew up in more of a Jewish Kwanza, Ramadan type of family, so a lot of these we didn't get to. Ella's version is the Supreme version. Blossom Deary has a great.

good one too but it's just an amazing amazing it's more of a winter tune right it's all about you know it's it's about cuddling up got it you know in front of a fire sexy times so sexy time song sexy time all right well speaking of amazing songs for number seven i would like to present as our penultimate we are going to have a bonus but um the my favorite holiday tune of all time so you went with you went with the big dog one number one yeah and then you kind of you know it was downhill slippery slow. What? But this, I'm coming strong with Amazing Grace. Not a Christmas tune. I think, okay, you've got wintery holiday, Wisconsin-y songs. I can do. Amazing grace. Man, what praises the Lord more than Amazing Grace? But that's just a gospel song. Amazing.

They sing it in the summertime. You haven't heard the reason for the season? You know what the season for the season is? It's not all about Santa Claus or Satan Clause. I've heard about, yeah, come on, man. Amazing Grace. What do you say, Andrew? Is that a holiday song? Christmas song? I don't know. Andrew's hedging. We said, Andrews, he's given the hedging face. Yeah, but we didn't say Christmas songs.

We said holidays, holiday tunes. Anyway, I love Amazing Grace. Okay? You got a problem with Amazing Grace? No, I don't have a problem with the tune. It just doesn't, to me, is not a Christmas song, but... But in the bleak midwinter is Christmas? Well, it's holiday-ish.

Well, it's wintery, at least. There's nothing wintery about Amazing Grace. Well, I don't know about that. All right. I'll let it slide this one time. Speaking of winter, speaking of holiday, Let's talk about Black Friday. Because that's today, my friend.

Did you realize that? Are you getting your shopping on? I am getting my shopping on, man. You know what? Until we had Open Studio, I didn't really realize what Black Friday was all about. And then now, like, I noticed how many people are so into shopping on this day. And it's become such an online. I love it.

I'm ashamed to say because I know it's... I'm going to buy a TV this year, I think. I have a whole list. I mean, I already did a bunch this morning. No, man. It is Black Friday. and we do have some deals. We do have some deals

that Open Studio Jazz are one of our sponsors. Yeah, that's right. And you're going to want to go there and use... Do we mention it yesterday? Yeah, the coupon code is listen. Yeah, now we can just be open about it.

We're not being cryptic or anything. Listen, L-I-S-T-E-N, enter that for our biggest discount. It's so big, we can't even say what it is. But it's bigger than you're going to see it first. Once you put what you want in your cart and you can go piano access pass. If you don't have a membership with us,

we would like to invite you as a perfect time to join is a member, which means you'll get a whole year of every single piano course we have. And one of the exciting things about it is it's everything we're going to have. You're going to have to trust us. We got some good stuff coming on the pipeline. We got some more jazz basics coming.

We have so many piano courses coming out in 2020. It's ridiculous. And at all different levels. And even if just what you're going to start with, it's like 14 courses and 600 lessons or something crazy. So you've got plenty. It's only piano. You're not paying for anything that you don't need. We also have the all-access pass. If you play multiple instruments, that's a great way to go.

You can go with the individual courses, gifting, everything, workbooks, everything's on sale, and use promo code listen for our biggest savings ever offered. And the code only works up until Sunday night. Sunday night at 11.59 p.m. That's right. So get in where you can fit in before that time. And because a lot of people are excited in shopping and we have limited availability on many of these items, you're going to want to actually go today.

Actually, is that true? Yeah, you will. We're going to run out. No, we don't. Well, the workbooks, we might. We could run out of workbooks. But the courses themselves, the piano access pass, that'll be there all weekend. Don't delay. Go now.

Use the code word. Because you can be practicing the next couple of days with your new course. Inspiration. Yeah, you got Saturday, Sunday off. Go on. And if you get a chance, also, this is a perfect compliment. AnyTune the app. You can download it for free, the regular version, which is not super limited.

They're very generous with the features. They are. But if you like it, go ahead and upgrade to the pro. Very reasonably priced. Please go to this link if you do it just so that they know we sent you. It's kind of like they used to say, mention us when you go into the store. And that would be any tune. A, N-E-Tune, A-N-Y-T-U-N-E.

That U.S. Very patriotic of them. Slash, you'll hear it. I love it. Go there, and they got a nice little breakdown. You'll know you at the right place. You'll see our logo, their logo. Get with that app.

iOS, Android, for the Mac, for IBM, for Commodore 64. It's available on all platforms. It will not work on Commodore. It will not work on that. Some of those, it will work. Oh, can they still sign up for the giveaway? They can still sign up for the giveaway.

for the giveaway. No purchase necessary. But if you do buy something, you're automatically entered in the giveaway. We should say that. Purchase, encourage. That we can say. Yeah, yeah. Well, until next week. You'll hear it. Hey, Adam. Yeah. We forgot something. Yeah. Do you think anybody's still listening? No. Well, I always wonder, like,

do people go all the way to the end? Because once we say, you'll hear it, I feel like lots of people might have left already. I agree, but they were... Is you anybody out there? They were owed a bonus. I know. Well, we just remember. So we're doing a very rare at... It's not even it's sort of an ad on here. And you are interested anyway. This is the appendix

of the book. The appendix. We're going to append this episode like we very rarely do. And the bonus is let it snow. Yeah. Which you thought was weird because you didn't like the first one. It was number six. Okay, so I'm going to hit you to a little something. Little group, take yourself back in time to young

Adam, young Peter, not quite as young. Back to a time we like to call the early 90s. Maybe in the late 80s. I'm wearing parachute skids, pants, Maybe Zika Veevesi jeans, an IOU sweatshirt and a gold chain. And a member's only jacket in case it's a little chilly outside. You know what I'm saying?

I had a fade and an earring, I think. Nice. I had hair. That was nice. That was the big change. A little band called Boys to Men. I loved me some. Now that we've come.

No, get up on that mic. Don't be bass. I'm only singing because nobody's listening. I know. I know. This is so fun. We're just, this is actually what usually happens. So this is like, this is the appendix version.

Hashtag appendix. Ooh. No, hashtag appendix is in our body. Okay. So, no, let it snow. Yeah. Let it snow. Here we go. Here we go. Let it snow. Totally different song from our other stuff.

Bo-do-bap. Brian McKnight produced. It's not even the same tune. It's not the same song. It's a whole different tune called Let It Snow. It's kind of better. Well, of course it's better because that's what's trying to tell you before. Original Let Snow is total crap. No, it's really good.

I would put it on here, but we might get kicked off. off of something if I play some of it. So I'm gonna play it for you. Even the record companies aren't listening anymore. Okay, good. All right, we'll throw a little bit up here, okay? Let us know by Boys to Man.

All right, happy holidays, y'all. You'll hear it again.