2023, holidays, Media, Music, Uncategorized

Tchaikovskied Out

37 Comments

Winnipeg has a rather renowned ballet company as well as a wonderful symphony orchestra. One December when we lived there we attended a production of The Nutcracker with some friends. These friends were good friends with two of the musicians, a cellist and a French horn player who were a couple, and who played in the Winnipeg Symphony as well as the orchestra for the ballet.

We all went back to our house after the performance. I was excited to play a new recording of some classical piece I had purchased, but the musicians pleaded with me to put on some jazz instead. They explained that they had played so many performances of The Nutcracker for Christmas that it felt like they had been eating nothing but sugar for weeks.

I confess I am getting tired of all the Tchaikovsky on the radio stream. I could also be happy if I didn’t hear John Rutter’s choral piece about the donkey for the rest of the season.

What is too much of a good thing ? What Christmas music are you getting tired of?

37 thoughts on “Tchaikovskied Out”

  2. A lot of theater people are tired of the Nutcracker, doing it year after year. For whatever reason, I’ve never been in the right place at the right time, and the groups I work with don’t perform it. I’ve seen it once or twice, but not had to work on it year after year. I am still able to enjoy Tchaikovsky at this point, but y’all know my feelings on Christmas music.

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  3. Our boom box died, which is how I usually play my favorite Christmas CDs (and tapes :-$ )… so I’ve not even heard the radio much, and can hardly wait to resolve this. I’ve heard enough of Amahl this year, simply because it wouldn’t leave my head for several days after seeing the performance.

    I’m with you about the Nutcracker music.

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    1. Take that ipad and download the Pandora App. Then select one of the Christmas music feeds and you are all good. Then you can go to a secondhand shop and find a CHEEP CHEEP CD player for the old CDs.

      I have to excavate one of our old CD players for the same project.

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  5. Dare I say chocolate might qualify as eligible to be too much of a good thing? For me, sweets of any kind can be too much of a good thing. The sugar high from overdosing on chocolate chip cookies or ice cream smothered in the World’s Best Hot Fudge is a b***h to come down from. 🙂

    RE–Christmas music: The Twelve Days of Christmas can burn in Hell as far as I’m concerned. (Yeah, I know. A bit harsh, but come on folks, it gets really tiresome really fast.)

    I tend to tire more quickly from the secular holiday songs like Frosty the Snowman, Winter Wonderland, Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer, etc. Most of the religious songs are okay if the arrangement is decent. And to me, a great arrangement of a mediocre song makes it bearable.

    Chris in Owatonna

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  6. Rise and Hear It Again. And Again, Baboons,

    My Christmas music fatigue hit years ago. It became especially irritating during my years of managing a waiting room music feed. My former office was in St. Paul’s Highland Park neighborhood which is diverse. Our Jewish and Muslim clients objected to Christian music of any ilk, including Christmas. I did not have a problem with their opinion, but getting “waiting room” playlists by Spotify algorithms to play secular music while omitting religious music was a fulltime job. And then there was the issue of Leonard Cohen’s song, “Hallelujah.” That has been recorded waaaay too often by way too many artists. I think I even heard a version by Joe Cocker. Thumbs Down.

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    1. But I should add what I said a few days ago. My only music is silence. Sandy does not want to listen to music, Just watch TV. Odd, very. For her to give up on listening to Christmas music.

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  8. 45’s lawsuits are too much of a good thing. It is nearly impossible to keep track of them all.
    Soon after Labor Day, a cable channel preempted Columbo and Murder, She Wrote in favor of 24/7 Christmas movies. Too much sugary romance.

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  11. If I could go for the rest of my life without hearing the Brenda Lee thing about rockin’ around the Christmas tree (whether the original or anyone’s cover of it), my remaining years on this side of the veil would be enhanced.

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  12. Too much of a good thing – food at most restaurants, particularly beverages. If you ask for a glass of water, you get a pint sized glass. Unless there’s a senior menu (one of the only good things about Perkins), you get enough food for 2-3 meals.

    And sweets available everywhere, but especially at Christmas.

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  13. I’m the outlier… I love The Nutcracker Suite. I’m not sure I can have too much of it. I’m particularly fond of the Mikhail Barshynikov version. I also like the pieces from the Suite used in Fantasia. Bring it on.

    I don’t listen to much of the “current” stuff. I’ve heard that there is an online game out there where you get points (or something) for every day from December 1-24 that you can go without hearing that dreadful Eartha Kitt song (love Eartha, just not the song). I don’t even want to say it outloud.

    I have a good collection of holiday CDs, almost all of them “off the beaten track” and I play them a fair amount. I also like to ask Alexa to play “traditional carols” or songs by specific groups when I’m in the kitchen. This had lead to a bunch of fun discoveries!

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  14. I have grown tired of many of the secular Christmas songs though I do still like LeRoy Anderson’s Sleigh Ride and his orchestral Christmas Fantasy (Fantasia?). I like what MPR Classical is doing right now – a mix of traditional, non traditional, and non holiday music. They could play The Nutcracker music a bit less frequently. I have a bunch of Christmas CDs that I rarely play anymore. Of those, the ones I like best are Cantus, St. Olaf Choir, Dale Warland Singer’s Echoes of Christmas, and Celtic Christmas. One CD I no longer have and wish I did is Carpenter’s Christmas Portrait. I don’t care for every song but love Karen’s voice.

    OT update: I am now in a boot, which I am allowed to remove for bathing (such as I can do these days), icing my swollen foot, and wiggling (barely) my ankle. However, I still have 4+ weeks of non weight bearing to go – that also means no driving. Fortunately my calendar is much less busy now so I can concentrate on healing and keeping up my strength so that when I can do weight bearing it will be easier than if I have just been sitting around.

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  15. One thing I’m tired of is WP forcing me to log in for everytime I want to comment. It takes some of the joy of writing away.

    I’m not a fan of the secular, jingly-jangly Christmas music. It doesn’t even get old with me anymore – I just don’t like it. I would rather listen to silence than that.

    I do like choral music from the local colleges. Singing with the massed chorus and Manitou Singers at St. Olaf was a peak experience of my life.

    Happy winter’s solstice, Baboons. Peace and joy to all of you.

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  16. Well, here goes. WP doesn’t seem to like me today. Maybe it senses my mood. It wasn’t helpful of WP to eat my post. If it does it again, I will have to try again some other day.

    I’m beyond tired of secular Christmas music. I don’t get tired of it anymore, I just turn it off. Most of it sounds noisy and jingle-jangly to me. That was the hardest part of the little event we played for. I didn’t care for most of the musical selections but it wasn’t up to me. I did like “Bring a Torch, Jeanette Isabella.” I played recorder on it.

    I do really love choral music, especially at this time of year. I like to try to follow all the different parts in the arrangement. The more complicated the better. The St. Olaf Choir arrangements of “Beautiful Savior” and “Jeg er saa glad hver Julekveld” are exquisite and I love them.

    Happy Winter’s Solstice to all of you and to your families and loved ones too. May the return of light bring peace all over the world. ~Krista

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  17. The song that is most irritating to me these days is the one that was coopted by a pharmaceutical company hawking its allergy medicine. “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year.” I suppose the idea is that spring is lovely if only you don’t have problems with allergies. But the song isn’t about spring, it’s about Christmas. And they didn’t bother to change any lyrics or anything. It’s a Christmas song that gets played in this stupid commercial ad nauseum, pun intended. The song was never a favorite of mine, but I really can’t stand it now.

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