qumbler

“If the pristine musicality of the first version and the rich sonority of the second situate the simple melody in a sound world that connects it with the unpretentious yet satisfying harmonizations that serve as part of the history of the carol as a genre, the almost ludicrously facile approach to the final version denudes the melody of nuance, revealing it in all its banality; these are the trivial and barking tones of the modern insipid notion of Christmas that the Peanuts special deprecates.”