A Long Time, Part 2
1. Santa Claus Is Coming To Town
2. Away In A Manger
3. Babes In Toyland
4. What Child Is This
5. Let It Snow, Let It Snow
6. It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas
7. O Little Town Of Bethlehem
8. O Holy Night
9. Oh Come All Ye Faithful
10. Silver Bells
11. The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire)
12. Ave Maria (Schubert)
13. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
14. I'll Be Home For Christmas
15. The First Noel
16. White Christmas
17. It Came Upon A Midnight Clear
18. Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
19. Joy To The World
20. Silent Night
2. Away In A Manger
3. Babes In Toyland
4. What Child Is This
5. Let It Snow, Let It Snow
6. It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas
7. O Little Town Of Bethlehem
8. O Holy Night
9. Oh Come All Ye Faithful
10. Silver Bells
11. The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire)
12. Ave Maria (Schubert)
13. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
14. I'll Be Home For Christmas
15. The First Noel
16. White Christmas
17. It Came Upon A Midnight Clear
18. Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
19. Joy To The World
20. Silent Night
Fisher Fazio was a great grocery store here in Northern Ohio. Unfortunately, they were put out of business by a cartel of grocers, who were able to undercut them at the Cleveland ports, where produce and meats were shipped in.
ReplyDeleteI think there was a whole generation of grocers that were lost when big business started invading the grocery industry. But I guess that's the nature of things. Can't live in the past...
DeleteAnon beat me to the explanation of Fisher Fazio. It's odd that Longines would license this material both to a national retailer and a local one.
ReplyDeleteI think Longines would license it to anyone with a buck. I feel like I've seen plenty of other local overprinted versions of this music. Maybe I need to start paying more attention when I see them and document a few.
DeleteThis set was also branded for sale at Mayfair Supermarkets.
ReplyDeleteMayfair, eh? That name sounds familiar... Yeah, I shared a 7" EP from Mayfair back in 2023, one of my favorites from that season. If you haven't downloaded it, go give it a listen!
Deletehttps://ernienotbert.blogspot.com/2023/12/7-special-part-5.html
The Shell one at the top is the one I usually encounter during my thrift store record hunts. However, I have never picked it up. This post may encourage to buy one the next time I encounter one.
ReplyDeleteI haven't paid much attention to any of them prior to this year, but I was pleasantly surprised that I liked most of what I heard. Not excited by all the overlap in the series, but we've seen other labels do much, much worse.
DeleteFrom what I can tell, by listening to the tracks, on my iTunes... The majority of this album is from "The Longines Symphonette-Home For The Holidays" 1965
ReplyDeleteand six tracks are from "The Longines Symphonette-Christmas At The Fireside" 1960
I'm thinking you'll drive yourself crazy trying to figure out where each of these tracks originated. :)
DeleteOK, I've done all the required listening comparisons, and here's my take:
DeleteShell Vol. 1 was 1967, Shell Vol. 2 was 1968, and Shell Vol. 3 was 1969.
Shell Vol. 3 could not have been issued in 1968 (as some say) -- it is the only Shell volume to contain tracks from the 1969 Longines LP "Silver Bells" (which was a free bonus LP of new recordings when you ordered the 1969 4-LP box "Family Christmas Treasury," also all-new recordings, and unfortunately 95% of the new 1969 stuff is rinky-dink doodles on the Thomas organ).
It's also very doubtful that Shell 1-2-3 were 1970-71-72, as Discogs says. If Shell 1 & 2 were that late (70-71), they would have also recycled the new 1969 tracks, as Shell 3 did, but they feature only 1964 and 1966 Longines tracks.
And if Shell 3 were 1972, it would have recycled tracks from the 1972 box of (mostly) new recordings called "Christmas with the Charoliers." But it doesn't.
Sounds good to me. Now enter those dates and your reasoning over at Discogs.
DeleteAt one point I tried to untangle all of these releases and it just made me crazy, so I put it away. Maybe someday I'll take another stab at it.
ReplyDeleteAn anonymous contributor here in the comment section has gone a long way towards figuring out many of the dates, and what's new and what's not. Lots of good info and fairly close to definitive as far as I'm concerned.
DeleteThis collection is just as nice as the two others in this series. Nothing special, but nothing not worth listening too.
ReplyDeleteQuestion: Did any of these companies that put out these collections, have a say in what was included? Or was it, take what you get.
With a collection like this, I don't think you get to pick. However, there are collections of various artists that I have seen where I get the impression tracks were selected in a less than random matter. If I were to put together such a collection, it would certainly be a bit more eclectic that what you usually see. :)
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