Saturday, January 10, 2026

A Long Time, Part 2

Next up in today's march of records put out by The Longines Symphonette is Shell's Wonderful World Of Music Volume II-Special Christmas Edition (The Longines Symphonette Society 2xLP LWSH-7/8, Stereo, 1971). I actually determined that another record in the collection was a duplicate of this one released under a different name. For many years I assumed all the records I had from the Longines Symphonette contained the same music, but I was wrong. Near as I could tell, these two were the only exact duplicates. I've dropped all the scans of both records in the download and I'll put both album covers here in the post. The second one was titled Christmas At Home, just for the search engines. And Fisher Fazio, what was that, some kind of grocery store?

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

MEGA


Posted by Ernie at 1/10/2026 08:00:00 AM

10 comments:

  1. AnonymousSaturday, January 10, 2026 8:29:00 AM

    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.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ErnieSaturday, January 10, 2026 4:59:00 PM

      I 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...

      Delete
  2. BusterSaturday, January 10, 2026 10:51:00 AM

    Anon 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.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ErnieSaturday, January 10, 2026 5:00:00 PM

      I 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.

      Delete
  3. AnonymousSaturday, January 10, 2026 11:00:00 AM

    This set was also branded for sale at Mayfair Supermarkets.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ErnieSaturday, January 10, 2026 5:01:00 PM

      Mayfair, 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!

      https://ernienotbert.blogspot.com/2023/12/7-special-part-5.html

      Delete
  4. musicman1979Saturday, January 10, 2026 2:41:00 PM

    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.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ErnieSaturday, January 10, 2026 5:02:00 PM

      I 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.

      Delete
  5. JonathanSaturday, January 10, 2026 11:22:00 PM

    From 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
    and six tracks are from "The Longines Symphonette-Christmas At The Fireside" 1960

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ErnieSunday, January 11, 2026 1:08:00 PM

      I'm thinking you'll drive yourself crazy trying to figure out where each of these tracks originated. :)

      Delete

All comments are greatly appreciated, but replies aren't guaranteed...

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)