RCA producer Ethel Gabriel worked on the Melachrino Strings’ “Moods in Music” series and in the late 1950s developed the Living Strings as a package for RCA’s budget label, Camden, using various orchestras, mainly from Europe. The albums were all centred on a theme: the sea, the West, Broadway, night music. The recordings made by The Living Strings became a mainstay of easy-listening radio and commercial venues.
Johnny Douglas, one of England’s masters of string arranging, was the primary arranger and conductor for the series recorded in England. He brought great songs to a new life with his arrangements of a mass of pure velvety strings, mellow brass and superb solos played by the cream of the British musicians of that era.
This release brings together three of the albums he recorded in the 1960s and 1970’s. Christmas is a time of emotions, in this digitally re-mastered double album the Johnny Douglas orchestra and singers musically express every emotion, memory and feeling, which traditionally accompanies this glorious season, with a mixture of Christmas songs and traditional carols. A few of the titles are repeated, once even twice, but with different arrangements. To delete the repeats would render the original albums incomplete and deprive the listener of the opportunity to experience the versatile arranging by Johnny Douglas.
CD1
1. White Christmas
2. Silver Bells
3. Medley: Wassail Song / The First Noel / Angels We Have Heard On High / Joy To The World
4. Mary's Boy Child
5. Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
6. Medley: We Wish You A Merry Christmas / We Three Kings / It Came Upon a Midnight Clear / O Holy Night / Silent Night
7. Medley: O Come, All Ye Faithful / Oh Little Town Of Bethlehem / Coventry Carol / Away In A Manager
8. It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas / Intro: Deck the Halls
9. Home For The Holidays
10. The Christmas Song
11. I'll Be Home For Christmas
12. The Little Drummer Boy
CD2
1. White Christmas
2. Happy Holiday
3. Here’s To You
4. My Favourite Things
5. Medley: Christmas Lullaby / Silent Night
6. Do You Hear What I Hear
7. Medley: Ring Christmas Bells / We Wish You A Merry Christmas
8. The Little Drummer Boy
9. Medley: Buon Natale / Jingo Jango / Jingle Bells / Bossa Nova Noel
10. A Merry Christmas Song
11. Medley: Deck The Halls / Hark! The Herald Angels Sing / O Come, All Ye Faithful / Joy To The World
12. Medley: I Heard The Bells On Christmas Day / White Christmas
13. Medley: O Little Town Of Bethlehem / Silent Night / Away In A Manger / Angels We Have Heard On High
14. Out Of The East
15. Medley: We Three Kings Of Orient Are / Coventry Carol / It Came Upon The Midnight Clear / O Holy Night
16. Medley: Jingle Bells / Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer / God Rest Ye Merry Christmas
17. Medley: Wassail Song / The First Noel / O Christmas Tree / Green Needles
18. Medley: The Little Drummer Boy / Toyland
19. Do You Hear What I Hear
20. Medley: Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas / I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus / I’ll Be Home For Christmas
