Day 25: 'Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas' - Judy Garland

I stress every year that this is no all-time Christmas song chart or listing of the best of the year so the 25th song should be no different from the others (My joint winners this year would be Dylan and Thea Gilmore if it were) but the very notion of a calendar usually means Christmas Day gives you the biggest window or the largest chocolate so, to get round that, I've usually gone with a track dedicated to Lady Blagg to neatly sidestep the issue.

This year though, again tugged by the emotions of the season, I've pulled the song I was going to select and gone with dear old Judy and dedicated it to .... well, me really.

The resonance of the lyrics 'next year all our troubles will be out of site' and 'From now on, our troubles will be far away' are not lost on me and I trust 2010 will see me fully employed and earning a shed-load once more.

This is the original version of the song, first sung by Garland in 1944's 'Meet me in St Louis' and probably more in keeping to my mood. Sinatra recorded it too, of course, but he asked Dean Martin to change the lyrics to make it 'more upbeat' and to celebrate the current season rather than looking forward to a better one. I thought the original more apt.

You can see Judy's performance here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5g4lY8Y3eoo