Dear Supporter of the Holiday Music Hall of Fame:

As you might have heard from the indictments, it’s been a rough year for our (still unbuilt and still completely fictional) Holiday Music Hall of Fame. Our plans to build a museum worthy of these holiday music classics on the hallowed slopes of Mount Crumpit have been fought at every turn by the Whoville Planning Commission, which has raised specious objection after specious objection to our plans — and we expect another rough go of it in our appeal to the Whoville Land Use Board of Appeals. All this has thrown a substantial wrench into our fundraising goals, as you might imagine. But to claim that we’ve attempted to bribe planning commissioners is slanderous and ludicrous. We intend to fight this case all the way to the Whoville Supreme Court or until our money runs out.

In these trying times, it gives us comfort to focus on our key mission: To identify and honor those recordings of holiday songs that are so definitive, it should be illegal for anyone else to record them ever again. (We would still allow artists to perform these songs in concert — we’re not monsters — but the moment they step into a recording studio some July to record yet another Christmas album, our attorneys would swing into action to stop this blasphemy. Yes, we understand that we will need a small army of legal eagles just to keep an eye on Pentatonix.)

Let us put this another way: Let’s say you’ve been exiled to a desert island and can only take recordings of five holiday tunes with you. Which recorded performances would you select?

Surely, you would consider tracks such as Bing Crosby singing “White Christmas” or Elvis Presley performing “Blue Christmas.” Or Joni Mitchell’s “River” or Bruce Springsteen’s cover of “Santa Claus is Coming to Town.” All of these tracks have been enshrined in our Holiday Music Hall of Fame.

But — to paraphrase the wisdom of The Beach Boys — because Christmas comes each time this year, the time has come to nominate additional performances for inclusion in the Hall of Fame. To jog your memory, we’ve included a list of those songs that already have been inducted, along with the performances in our Modern Wing, meant to honor songs written during the 21st century. (Where else will Pentatonix find material for its 2035 album?)

For your listening pleasure, we have included a Spotify playlist of the songs in the Hall of Fame. As an added bonus, we also have included a brand-new Spotify playlist of holiday songs mostly recorded this year. (A note about the new list: Although we believe most holiday music is — shall we say “downbeat?” — the year just past has been so distressing that we could not bear to include any downers this year. The most depressing song on the new list is titled “Dumpster Divin’ on Christmas Eve,” which should be a bummer but which, somewhat surprisingly, is not. Another song rhymes “Rudolph” with “Smirnoff,” which is genius, if you ask us. The new list actually includes two songs about cookies! That’s because we need it this year.)

In the meantime, we are accepting your nominations for performances for both the Hall of Fame and the Modern Wing. Nominate as many as you’d like. In a typical year, we would induct two songs into the Hall of Fame and one into the Modern Wing. We have a pretty good bead on one performance for the Hall of Fame this year but the other slot is wide-open, as is the slot reserved for the Modern Wing.

We understand that this is a busy time — after all, it’s the most wonderful time of the year — so we’re keeping the window for nominations open until 3 p.m. Thursday, which is Christmas. Leave a nomination in the comments below or send an email to [email protected].

Here are the songs that have been enshrined thus far in the Hall of Fame or have won honorary mentions:

Holiday Music Hall of Fame

• Darlene Love, “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)”
• Elvis Presley, “Blue Christmas”
• Nat King Cole, “The Christmas Song”
• Bing Crosby, “White Christmas” (with honorable mentions going to the covers by Otis Redding and The Platters)
• Eartha Kitt, “Santa Baby”
• The Beach Boys, “Little Saint Nick”
• Judy Garland, “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”
• Brenda Lee, “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree”
• Charles Brown, “Merry Christmas Baby”
• Tyler Ravenscroft, “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch”
• Vince Guaraldi Trio, “Christmas Time is Here”
• Joni Mitchell, “River”
• Billie Holiday, “I’ve Got My Love to Keep Me Warm”
• Diana Krall, “Jingle Bells”
• Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, “Santa Claus is Coming to Town”
• Ukrainian Chorus Dumka NY and others, “Shchedryk (Carol of the Bells”)
• John Lennon, Plastic Ono Band and Yoko Ono, “Happy Christmas (War is Over)”
• Mariah Carey, “All I Want for Christmas is You”
• Ella Fitzgerald, “Sleigh Ride”

Honorary mentions

• The Platters, “White Christmas”
• Otis Redding, “White Christmas”
• Leonard Cohen, “Hallelujah”
• Bing Crosby and David Bowie, “The Little Drummer Boy”
• Debbie Gibson, “Sleigh Ride”

The Modern Wing

• Sia, “Snowman”
• Sia, “Santa’s Coming for Us”
• JD McPherson, “Hey Skinny Santa!”
• Kelly Clarkson, “Underneath the Tree”

Here’s the Holiday Music Hall of Fame playlist. (As we understand it, you have to be on Spotify to listen to the entire songs.)

And here’s the exclusive-to-you list of Christmas 2025 selections. Bake some cookies and enjoy.