What Wee Sing at Christmas

(no, that is not a typo)

One of my favorite Decembered memories is the way our little family used to sing along to a cassette tape (remember those?) entitled, Wee Sing for Christmas. The tape and the songbook came out the year my daughter was born and for years after that, all through Advent, whenever we piled into the car that tape went into the dash and we started singing again.

It also accompanied us as the kids and their mom decorated the tree, usually on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. I got it home and into the stand (having trimmed the bottom); my work was done.

Wee Sing was musical theater, with a preposterous premise: a group of carolers (apparently with a brass orchestra, guitars and perhaps a portable piano in tow) comes to a random family’s door. Not to worry: as one of the children at home says, “Some of them...arourneighbors.” (Poor kids; we laughed at the script and cadences every time).

At which point you hear the singers: “Here we come a caroling among the leaves so green; here we come a’wandering, so fair to be seen…” A couple of songs later the family, apparently, responds with songs of their own. The back and forth for continues for a while, at which point one of the family kids invites the singers in so they can all sing together. (OohthatdbeGREAT! See note above) And for the next hour or so, they hit most of the standards. And a couple of...not standards.

I have no idea how many times our family rolled the tape, as it were, and sang along, but Wee Sing for Christmas was as much a part of our family’s traditions as reading “Why Christmas Trees Aren’t Perfect,” by Richard H. Schneider.

Our attempted reading, rather. I mean, we would eventually get through it, but it took all four of us.

We brought it out when we got the tree home and we knew what would happen: once the tree was in the stand, one of us would start reading about this small kingdom in the Carpathian mountains—and, as if on cue, to blubber.

In this little kingdom, all the trees in the forest worked hard to be perfect (with graceful, sloping branches, tender green needles, etc) because on the first Saturday of Advent the Queen would come looking for a tree for the castle, and only a perfect Christmas tree had a chance of being selected. Smallpine had for years seemed a shoe-in for the honor, but over the course of some pages, Smallpine lowered it branches to protect a rabbit, made room for a frightened bird, gave its needles to a hungry fawn. Each act of generosity damaged its shape.

I am not saying that it looked, by the end, like Charlie Brown’s tree, but it was pretty beat-up. All the other perfect trees sneered at Smallpine’s condition, but, of course, the Queen chooses Smallpine precisely because the imperfections reminded her of the various mercies of Jesus. And that in why, anymore, Christmas trees are not perfect.

And that is also why we could not get through the book.

Whoever was reading would make it only a page or two before they started crying. Another of us would take the book and read another page or two. And start crying. And hand the book to the next reader. All of us were blubbering by the time we finished, after which it was time to decorate.

And to bring Wee Sing for Christmas in from the car.

It’s been a long time, now, but I was reminded of it all again the other day when a buddy and I were heading to lunch and, for some reason, he was surprised to realize that I had my radio tuned to Sirius-XM’s Holiday Traditions. His reaction suggested I have a reputation of sorts.

“You like Christmas music? Secular Christmas music?”

Yes. Kinda. Sorta. Sometimes. Not everything.

“The other channel plays the songs that are more religious.”

Yeah, I don’t listen to those. So many of them are annoying.

“I don’t know what is more surprising: that you do listen to some secular songs of the season, or that you don’t listen to the songs with the message of Christmas.”

That’s when I remembered and told him about Wee Sing.

Besides, I said, there are just so many “religious” songs I don’t like. “Mary, Did you Know?” I mean, of course Mary knew.

“So, you prefer Alvin and the Chipmunks to the choir of St. Martin in the Fields?”

Hey! I had an Alvin album back in the day. I remember this one song about Hula Hoops. No, there is a lot of secular stuff that I don’t care for, either. “It’s a Marshmallow World”? “Rocking Around the Christmas Tree”? I loathe “Mele Kalikimaka,” too.

And what’s up with “The Little Drummer Boy?” Is that religious? Secular? Or just silly.

“I’m guessing “C” for you.”

Yep. Now, I like the carols. Most of them. I am deeply moved by some of them… but, here’s the thing: instead of “Joy to the World,” in a way, they make me sad. Personally. They kind of isolate me. which is ironic, because the “message of Christmas” as you call it is not only “Glory to God in the highest,” but also, “on earth, peace and good will among all people.”

“Which you preach.”

Absolutely. I believe and preach it; but what I experience is different. What we see in the world is different. Which makes the carols prophetic, in a way—but I am just saying that even “in house,” most times I have sung these songs more or less alone in the crowd. They remind me that anymore I am a stranger in a strange land. Some of my friends and family can’t sing those carols with me. Or won’t, because they don’t agree. They don’t believe. And if they do attend, say, a service of Lessons and Carols, it’s not about the message, it is about the music. About the chapel, not the stable.

And so the very songs of God’s love incarnated, manifested in Jesus birth… sometimes they draw lines rather than circles. They make me feel lonely when I know I am singing alone.

“White Christmas,” on the other hand? Everybody can sing that. And does. And if they are anything like me they may even feel something when they do. I get misty about every other time I hear Bing sing it. “White Christmas” is almost spiritual. There’s memory. There’s hope. Nature is a part of it. It is a prayer of a sort. It touches people, which is why it is a part of the secular liturgy—something we can all sing together no matter the form of our prayers.

“I get that, I guess. Still, I like singing about Jesus. ”

Oh, I do too. One of my favorites is Jay Althouse’s “Going to Bethlehem to see that Baby, Going to Bethlehem to see that Child… I’m gonna sing (sing! Sing! Sing!) heavenly melodies when I see that Child, I’m gonna shout (shout! Shout!) Hallelujah…” Man! That is the kind of song even Unitarians can sing.

Just saying that sometimes I am painfully aware of the sad social and spiritual isolations that Christmas evokes. And not just for me. Some of these secular songs take the edge off, though some of them are sad too. But their familiarity can make you smile again.

“So, what are some of your favorites on this channel?”

“Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” is one. I am not sure I love the term, “little” Christmas, but you can hear the longing for others, for blessing, for constancy.

“I’ll be home for Christmas,” the Karen Carpenter version, is to my ear a heaven hymn.

The production numbers, though, are my faves. Like “Sleighride.” The orchestral version, especially. Johnny Mathis’ “We need a little Christmas” (again with the “little”!). Andy Williams belts out the Doxology: “It’s the most wonderful time of the year.” And when he sings, “there’ll be scary ghost stories and tales of the glories of Christmases long, long ago?” This year, nearing my 70^th birthday—I finally realized the song is referencing “A Christmas Carol,” which I watch (alone) every Christmas Eve.

I like “Baby it’s co…” Wait. No, no. I don’t like that one. Unless I do. But, no. I mean, yes, it’s catchy, and I know it is supposed to be funny (though not as funny as some of the rewrites on YouTube), but no, I don’t like it. I mean the guy puts flunitrazepam in her egg nog! Really?

And, of course, Mel Torme’s “Chestnuts roasting by an open fire…” which I love even though I have never had a chestnut, roasted or otherwise. I am trying to revise it for Southerners: it will feature boiled peanuts.

We had arrived at the Bojangles, but as I got out of the car I thought to myself, I wonder if Wee Sing is still available on Amazon?

When I looked, I saw (happily) that we all sang Wee Sing.