10 Wild Facts About Your Favorite Christmas Songs

SHREVEPORT, La. (Ark-La-Tex Weekend) -

You can’t escape Christmas music during the holiday season. From inside stores to radio stations playing songs 24-7 and from symphonic concerts to church masses, holiday music helps gets us in the spirit of the season. But how much do you know about the carols and songs? We investigated and discovered these fun and mind blowing facts about some of our favorite Christmas Songs.

1. “Jingle Bells” by James Lord Pierpont is one of the most popular Christmas songs ever. He wrote it in 1857 in Medford, Mass. under the original title “The One Horse Open Sleigh” and it was intended to be for Thanksgiving. The song also holds the distinction of being the first song broadcasted from space on Gemini VI on December 16, 1965.

2. Elvis Presley holds the record for the best selling Christmas album. The best selling single of all time belongs to Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas.”

3. Christmas caroling was banned in England during the 1640s which lasted until 1660.

4. “Good King Wenceslas” and “O Come, All Ye Faithful” are considered to be two of the oldest Christmas carols still sung today, according to oldest.com.

5. The #1 holiday song in 2020, according to ASCAP, belongs to Mariah Carey and her hit song “All I Want for Christmas is You.”

6. “Carol of the Bells” originated in Ukraine based on a traditional folk chant around 1919.

7. Originally, you could go caroling in every season but only the winter caroling survived throughout the years.

8. The man who sang “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch” also voiced Tony the Tiger of Frosted Flakes fame; the late “grrrreat” Thurl Ravenscroft.

9. The first song to include Santa Claus was “Up On the Housetop” written in 1864.

10. On Christmas Eve in 1914, troops on both sides of World War I stopped fighting and sang Christmas carols bringing a brief halt to the war.

We hope you enjoyed these facts about Christmas music and carols. If you want to learn more about some other Christmas traditions, click here.

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