Wednesday, December 22, 2021

1940s Christmas Playlist - Part 22 - "Ol' Saint Nicholas" (1949)



Here's another 1949 song for our Christmas music playlist that didn't see a lot of recorded action: "Ol' Saint Nicholas."

I think the only recording was by Doris Day on Columbia Records:




The "Male Quartet" mentioned on the label is apparently the Sportsmen Quartet, who did  a lot of vocal backing on radio and records. We heard a bunch of examples back here.

I think that's a fun record and a snappy little song, so I wonder why nobody else recorded it.

It was the flipside of Doris's version of "Here Comes Santa Claus" and "Billboard" gave both sides a positive review in the October 8, 4949 issue:



The song "Ol' Saint Nicholas" really didn't "draw plenty of play" at the time, so it's very curious to me why it popped up again a couple of years later in the Warner Brothers movie "The Winning Team," again sung by Doris Day in a Christmas scene from the movie:



Doris Day was just adorable!

"The Winning Team" was a 1952 biopic of baseball Hall of Famer Grover Cleveland Alexander, so it wasn't Christmassy and you'd think "Ol' Saint Nicholas" had been forgotten. But, there you go!

The actor playing Alexander looks familiar to me. I wonder if he ever made a name for himself?

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