More Christmas Music I'd Share With My Other Dad, Tom Diehl

That's my "other" Dad, Tom, as a very happy not yet one-year-old circa 1937. Last year, after losing him to a brain tumor in April, I wrote what has since become my most viewed Christmas post in December. This year as I have been listening to much of the Christmas music released or re-released in 2017, I found myself wanting to share the following three albums with the man who entrusted me with his beautiful younger daughter's lifelong happiness.

Originally released in 1957, The Ames Brothers Christmas album There'll Always Be A Christmas soon became a perennial classic though it wasn't released on compact disc until 2006 and has since become highly collectible, fetching upwards of $400. Tom loved the music of The Ames Brothers and as far as I know, they were his second favorite vocal group behind The Mills Brothers. He would love this album, especially in its newly remastered 60th Anniversary Original Mono mix for 2017. (The Spotify playlist above features the fugazi stereo mix issued in 2006.)

During the thirty-two years Tom was in my life, I was continually surprised by which songs caught his fancy. Among the disparate songs I was asked to procure for him were: A Taste Of Honey's bass-heavy disco jam "Boogie Oogie Oogie", the stomping "Heartache Tonight" from the Eagles and The Brian Setzer Orchestra's take on "Jingle Bells". Colin James and The Little Big Band's Christmas album was originally released in 2007 and re-released on its tenth anniversary in 2017. The music is very similar to that of The Brian Setzer Orchestra's Christmas stylings. I think Tom would have liked listening to Christmas in his Chritsmas playlist.

Among his many skills and talents, Tom was a self-taught guitar picker with an appreciation for the playing of Chet Atkins, Tommy Emmanuel, and Jerry Reed, among others. Joel Paterson's Hi-Fi Christmas Guitar certainly evokes Atkins in each of its fourteen songs. Upon first listen, I would have sworn this was an album originally recorded in the late Fifties or early Sixties as it is retro sounding in the best possible way. Tom would have been tempted to pull out his own ax and play along while listening to Patterson's album.

🎄🎅🤶

This is the final Hideaway post for Christmas 2017. Best wishes, season's greetings and a Merry Christmas to all of you. New posts will resume December 26th.