The Carpenters’ New Christmas Album Is Out & Full of Holiday Favorites

Sure, you haven’t even picked up your Thanksgiving turkey yet, but let’s get real: The Christmas season has begun. And if you like to celebrate the Christmas season with the Carpenters, A&M/Ume has an early present for you: Christmas Once More, a collection of Carpenters Christmas tunes that marks the first release from the band since 2001’s As Time Goes By.

In their time as an active band, the Carpenters released one Christmas album, 1978’s Christmas Portrait; the 1984 album An Old-Fashioned Christmas was released a year after Karen Carpenter’s tragic death. Christmas Once More presents 16 tracks from both of those albums, remixed, remastered and specially curated by Richard Carpenter — including a version of “Merry Christmas, Darling” recorded with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.

The Carpenters’ signature Christmas song was originally written in 1944 by Frank Pooler, the choral teacher at California State University-Long Beach. In the late ’60s, he passed it on to his star students, Richard and Karen Carpenter, who had begun seeing some success as musicians and were looking for a new holiday song to sing. He recalled Richard writing new music for it “in 15 minutes.” Pooler forgot about the song until 1970, when he received a call from Richard inviting him to a recording studio — where he found that they had recorded “Merry Christmas, Darling.”

The song was released as a single in 1970, the same year they hit No. 1 with “Close to You.” “Merry Christmas, Darling” went gold. It was later included on Christmas Portrait, an album that spent 66 weeks on the Billboard charts — more than any of the Carpenters’ other releases except Close to You.

The song was also performed on their second TV Christmas special, 1978’s The Carpenters: A Christmas Portrait. (The special also famously included a song-and-dance number with Gene Kelly.)

Fifty-four years later, the song is a modern Christmas standard, covered by many artists, including Amy Grant, Lea Michele and Elvis … almost. According to a 2005 interview with Pooler, Presley couldn’t read music and learned songs by ear, but “he could not quite pick up on the bridge to ‘Merry Christmas, Darling.'”

The album is available on CD, LP and special limited-edition gold LP; you can purchase it here.

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Christmas Once More tracklist

“It Came Upon a Midnight Clear”
“Happy Holiday”
“The Christmas Waltz”
“Sleigh Ride”
“It’s Christmas Time/Sleep Well, Little Children”
“Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”
“Christ Is Born”
“Santa Claus Is Coming to Town”
“Merry Christmas, Darling” (RPO Version)
“The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire)”
“(There’s No Place Like) Home for the Holidays”
“Little Altar Boy”
“The First Snowfall/Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!”
“My Favorite Things/White Christmas/Ave Maria”

What Happened to Richard Carpenter?

He now has a new family band.

Remind