There are an estimated 50,000 plus Christmas songs in existence. Out of all of those offerings, may fall into relative obscurity, or resonate with a smaller portion of the holiday music loving population. The great ones get recorded a zillion times and you hear all one zillion versions leading up to Christmas.
The Best Selling Single Belongs To Christmas
One of the most popular, most re-recorded, and biggest selling song (not just Christmas…all-time) can trace it’s lineage to Washington State. While the man who wrote it was born in Russia before the Bolshevik Revolution, the man it is most closely associated with called Washington State his home.
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The only Christmas song that can fit that category is White Christmas. Written in 1940 by Irving Berlin, it was first heard in 1941 on the Christmas Day radio broadcast of NBC’s Kraft Music Hall. It was also the first time Tacoma born and Spokane raised Bing Crosby would croon the song.
The song would explode the following year when it was featured in the Crosby classic “Holiday Inn” and the rest would be history.
Crosby Was Already A Star, But…
Bing Crosby honed his talents in the Spokane area (he attended Gonzaga University but left without a degree) before heading to California in 1925. By the time White Christmas crossed his path, Crosby was a well established recording, radio, and movie star.
The song would make Bing one of the first global icons. His version alone is believed to have sold over 50 million copies worldwide (all other versions combined bring the total to around 100 million for the song itself), making it the best selling version of any song in history…