Intervals roasting…

Everyone is posting and sharing a video spoof on “The Christmas Song” right now. The lyrics have been changed to give some bit of insight into the theory behind the song.

Whether chosen intentionally or not, it would be hard to find a better song to do a theory spoof on. This is just a brilliantly written song–probably my favorite Christmas song by far.

This spoof is sort of focused on intervals but the real beauty comes from the harmonic plan which is far more sophisticated than than almost any song you will ever play.

I am not going lie. I am already a bit tired of Christmas music this year. I get tired of the same old arrangements of “Holly Jolly Christmas”, “Feliz Navidad,” “Jingle Bell Rock” etc. I wish people were writing more new songs or at least rerecording older songs in more current ways. But there are a lot of golden nuggets in the Christmas song list too. This song definitely qualifies.

Here is a lead sheet for “The Christmas Song” that I did a few years ago. It is the same lead sheet I played from on Seasonal Spice. It is probably the most difficult lead sheet I have ever written so don’t be surprised if it takes you a while to learn.

If you wonder where this harmony is coming from, this is traditional jazz harmony and I came up with it using reharmonization techniques I have learned in my studies in jazz. Enjoy it.