Monday Side-Session: Caravan Across the Century

Yesterday, we heard several versions of Juan Tizol’s classic Caravan as played by various Duke Ellington groups. For today’s side‑session, we’ll wander a little farther into the dunes and check out how other bands and artists have handled this ever‑mysterious tune.

“Caravan” might be the most recorded number in the entire Ellington band book, and from the very beginning it inspired wildly different interpretations. We’ll do a little decade‑hopping and hit some highlights.

1937: The First Wave of Covers

We start with Bunny Berigan on Victor, recorded just a couple of months after Duke’s own version:

A sharp arrangement by pianist Joe Lippman, and Bunny’s growl trumpet is absolutely convincing. He could do anything he wanted with that horn!

Next up, pianist Edgar Hayes and his band for Decca, also in 1937:

I think I say all the time that Edgar Hayes had an underrated band. I stand by that statement!

And the tune even crossed the Atlantic that same year, where Ambrose recorded it for British Decca:

Three takes from 1937, each bringing its own flavor to the journey.

1946–1949: New Rhythms, New Ideas

This caravan moves fast, so let’s hop off in 1946 to catch Charlie Barnet on the Apollo label:

Charlie could never resist an Ellington‑related number.

Then in 1948, pioneer electric guitarist Les Paul gives the tune a then‑modern facelift on this multitrack gem for Capitol:

Possibly the first guitar‑centric Caravan — but far from the last.

Next, tenor sax star Flip Phillips teams up with Latin legend Machito for this 1949 Mercury side:

I’m sure Juan Tizol approved!

1952–1953: A Curious Case of Influence

We enter the 1950s with a fascinating take by The Esquire Boys for the small Rainbow label in 1952:

A very cool reworking featuring guitarist Danny Cedrone, who would soon play the iconic solo on Bill Haley’s Rock Around the Clock.

Then comes the intrigue: Ralph Marterie’s hit version for Mercury in 1953.

Ralph’s record is clearly based on the Esquire Boys’ arrangement from the year before. Was it authorized? Hmmm…

Late ’50s: Stereo, Steel and Swing

Next stop: New Orleans, 1958, where Al Hirt includes an extended version on his Swingin’ Dixie! album for Audio Fidelity:

Lots of fun in early stereo!

The guitars return with Santo & Johnny, whose steel‑guitar take was recorded in 1959 and released as a single in 1960 on the Canadian-American label:

I’m a big fan of Santo & Johnny — Sleepwalk is one of my all‑time favorites.

1960s: Big Signatures from Big Names

I’m also a big fan of Pérez Prado, who cut this version for RCA Victor in 1964:

Sounds great!

Then in 1967, Bert Kaempfert records his own unmistakable take, released in the U.S. on Decca:

You could do a blindfold test and spot both Prado and Kaempfert instantly!

1976: Disco in the Dunes

A quick stop in 1976 for — of all things — a disco version of “Caravan” by Rhythm Heritage on ABC:

I was a young big‑band fan in 1976 and don’t remember hearing this one. I’m sure I would’ve been horrified, but now it’s a fun artifact of the era.

2000: A Rockabilly Blast

We end our trek as a new century dawns with Brian Setzer’s roaring take with his orchestra from the 2000 album Vavoom!:

A long ride — but worth every mile! But how do we get the sand out of all those guitar amps?

"Jingle Bells" - Part 100 - Stray Tracks!

Wow, I can't believe this is the 100th post about "Jingle Bells!"

We are still more-or-less in contemporary times with my vote for the current King of Christmas - Brian Setzer!

Since the first release by the Brian Setzer Orchestra in 1994, the ex-Stray Cats frontman has released three Christmas studio albums, plus various live albums and DVDs and compilations. He obviously loves Christmas music!

It all got started when the BSO recorded "Jingle Bells" for the soundtrack of the 1996 movie "Jingle All the Way":

That's just a blast!

I didn't see the movie back in  the day (still haven't) and didn't pick up the soundtrack album, but I thought I got the soundtrack version on the "Merry Axemas" compilation from 1997:

Obviously it's not the same recording as this one's an instrumental, although the arrangement is very similar.

Brian then re-recorded the vocal version for his first Christmas album "Boogie Woogie Christmas" in 2002:

That sounds a lot like the soundtrack recording, but it has a few differences.

So, for quite some time, I thought that the 2002 recording was the first with a vocal and that the instrumental was on the movie soundtrack.

Luckily, I wasn't particularly hindered as I went through life under that delusion!

I think I eventually caught on when I came across Brian's 1996 video of the soundtrack recording:

That made me research the situation!

I'm guessing he cut the soundtrack vocal version and the instrumental version at the same sessions back in 1996, as both recordings have the same credits, including producer Phil Ramone.

Here's a more recent clip from 2016:

Always sounds great!

In any event, now that I've reached 100 "Jingle Bells" posts with I-don't-even-know-how many-versions in lots of genres, I'm going to branch out a bit!

But, do you have a favorite version of "Jingle Bells" that I may have omitted?

"Jingle Bells" - Part 98 - Gone Country!

We move into the (relatively) contemporary Country Music field with "Jingle Bells," stopping in 1997 with the cassette-only release "Wrangler Cowboy Christmas Volume V" from Universal Music Special Markets.

It's hard for me to believe that 1997 was 25 years ago, but the math doesn't lie! I guess the fact that cassettes were still being issued at that time also tells the tale!

That was also early in the whole Internet deal, with most people still not having home computers, but it was all growing fast!

1997 saw the fifth volume of the "Wrangler Cowboy Christmas" series, which were promo cassettes sponsored by the famous jeans (dungarees?) company. I don't really know how they were originally issued, but I hadn't come across any of the series before Volume V, which I was able to purchase online!

This had me thinking that the Internet was the greatest thing ever! And I stand by that statement!

The Wrangler series rounded up (cowboy talk!) various tracks from prior releases from the MCA family of labels and Volume V featured a version of "Jingle Bells" by Tracy Byrd, the popular neo-Western Swing singer, who had recorded it as a one-off for MCA for a previous compilation:

I like that a lot! You can never go wrong with a Western Swing beat!

Tracy also had another Christmas single with an even more pronounced Western Swing arrangement with 1999's "Merry Christmas from Texas Y'all" on MCA:

That one's been on my Country Christmas playlist since it came out!

Tracy Byrd's most obvious influence is George Strait - my favorite - who has cast a large shadow on the Country Music scene since the early 1980s.

The Wrangler series always had a cut from George (naturally) and Volume V featured the great swing number "When It's Christmas Time in Texas":

That was originally featured on George's 1986 MCA release "Merry Christmas Strait to You!" which was his first Christmas album and holds up well!

Mr. Strait cut his version of "Jingle Bells" for his third Christmas album, "Fresh Cut Christmas" in 2006:

We could be here all day listening to great George Strait Christmas records!

Another county superstar, Alan Jackson, was featured on Volume V with his terrific version of "A Holly Jolly Christmas":

I think that record is absolutely brilliant! It's one of my favorite holiday records of all time!

It was first released as part of the soundtrack for 1992's "Home Alone 2" and I bought a cassette of that soundtrack just to have this cut!

Alan has also released a lot of great Christmas music and he recorded his version of "Jingle Bells" for his 2002 album "Let It Be Christmas" (his second Christmas album) on Arista Nashville:

That's another fun swingy arrangement, with some horns added in!

Christmas and Country Music have always seemed to work well together and these artists with their traditional roots keep it going!

"Jingle Bells" - Part 97 - Bubbly!

As we continue with "Jingle Bells," it's not too much of a jump from Canadian singer Diana Krall to Canadian crooner Michael Bublé!

He's joined by the Puppini Sisters on his version of "Jingle Bells" from his 2011 "Christmas" album on Reprise:

That's a lot of fun and it's obviously based on the famous 1943 record by Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters, down to Michael slipping in the "Oh, we'll have a lot of fun" à la Bing!

Here's a studio clip with Michael talking about the influence

:

I remember when this album came out that some Christmas purists (snobs, actually) were skeptical that a popular modern singer could record a solid holiday album and they were surprised it was good.

But those of us who were familiar with Michael Bublé's earlier work (and are not snobs anyway) knew he could handle a standard and were not surprised at the quality of the album!

Michael had actually released a Christmas EP back in 2003 (as Diana Krall had done in 1998) which featured his first version of "Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!":

That's a great showcase for his way with a standard!

As for the Puppini Sisters, the retro trio had recorded their own version of "Jingle Bells" for Verve in 2006:

That's also fun. The obvious inspiration seems to be the Andrews Sisters, but they must like the Boswell Sisters too!

That single was later followed by the Sisters' full-length album "Christmas With The Puppini Sisters" in 2010, which featured them retro-izing a variety of Christmas songs, including this take an often-heard modern classic:

That's a blast!

And Michael Bublé actually had a unique ballad arrangement of that song on his album:

For the record and since no one's asking, I do think the original by Mariah Carey is played a lot, but I like it, so more power to her!

Back to "Jingle Bells" and Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters and whatnot, Barry Manilow teamed with Exposé back in 1990 for an even more faithful version of that arrangement on his "Because It's Christmas" album on Arista:

I think that's fun too! How can you go wrong?

For completists, I'll point out that the Puppini Sisters sang the Bublé arrangement with singer/entertainment reporter Rory O'Connor on their 2020 "Christmas at Home" special and also overdubbed vocals with the London Symphony Orchestra onto the original Crosby/Andrews recording for the 2019 album "Bing at Christmas."

"Jingle Bells" - Part 95 - Tiki!

We stay somewhat in the modern world with some takes on "Jingle Bells" from the exotica/tiki/lounge world!

First up is the Blue Hawaiians with "Jungle Bells" from their 1995 album "Christmas On Big Island" on Restless Records:

The whole album is excellent and I quite like their version "Of Christmas Time is Here," the Vince Guaraldi tune from "A Charlie Brown Christmas":

That is awesome!

We move to 2001 with guitarist Vinnie Zummo for his version of "Jingle Bells" from his extremely descriptively-titled "A Retro Cool Bossa Nova Christmas with Vinnie Zummo" album:

You could definitely play that album at a cool holiday cocktail party!

Apparently no Scrooge, Vinnie has a "Volume 2" in the "Bossa Nova Christmas" series as well as the 2014 "A Retro Cool Mixed Bag Christmas" album on which we find "Jingle Bells Surf Party":

And we hit 2010 with Tiki Joe's Ocean from Double Crown Records' "Seasonal Favorites, Volume 3" album:

That's just a blast!

Tiki Joe's Ocean has a couple of Christmas albums which are really fun. "Vol. 2" contains a great take on another "A Charlie Brown Christmas" song - "Skating" - and both volumes can be purchased as downloads from their online store.

One more fun version of "Jingle Bells" comes from perhaps an unlikely source: the popular TV cartoon "SpongeBob SquarePants":

That show features some really cool background music!

Hopefully Santa's somewhere warm with an umbrella in his beverage listening to these tunes after a long holiday season!

"Jingle Bells" - Part 94 - Rockabilly!

Let's jump ahead to the 1990s and beyond with "Jingle Bells" for a handful of latter-day Rockabilly versions!

First up is the Honeydippers from the 1997 "12 Days of Christmas" album on the Shattered Music label:

That's a fun record, taking off from the 1957 Frank Sinatra arrangement by Gordon Jenkins.

I see this track sometimes credited to the Honeydrippers, which was the retro group led by Robert Plant that recorded "Sea of Love" on a memorable EP back in 1984, but this is the Honeydippers, featuring British singer Gary Twinn and American guitarist Danny B. Harvey.

SOme of the songs from "12 Days of Christmas" were included on 2001's "Swing Cats Present A Rockabilly Christmas" on Cleopatra, which also featured the titular Swing Cats with this snappy medley called "Christmas Tree Boogie":

I like that one a lot!

The Swing Cats were former Stray Cats Lee Rocker and Slim Jim Phantom with Danny B. Harvey and they cut some solid instrumentals.

Next is Reverend Horton Heat with their take on "Jingle Bells" from 2005's "We Three Kings" album on Yep Roc Records:

Reverend Horton Heat is one of those acts that's the group name, but the leader, in this case Jim Heath, is also known by the group name.

Here's the title track from that album:

We move to 2009 with Mexico's Rebel Cats version of "Jingle Bells" from their "Navidad Rock-A-Billy" on Grabaxiones Alicia:

That's very fun as well!

I also did "Triste Navidad," their take on "Blue Christmas":

Rockabilly and Christmas go together well!

"Jingle Bells" - Part 37 - Cha Cha Cha!

We land in 1959 with "Jingle Bells" and popular entertainer Pearl Bailey with this single on Roulette Records:

Hey, we've had a few Mambos, so why not a Cha Cha Cha?

The flipside of that record is a fun novelty Christmas song:

I think both sides are a lot of fun. Pearl Bailey had a ton of personality and it really shines through on that record!

"Billboard" agrees:

Swinging back around to Dinah Shore, here's a clip of Pearl on Dinah's show from 1960:

We go back a year to 1958 (I think!) for this odd but fun track by the Capitol Studio Orchestra:

I believe that track was first released on the "Christmas Cocktails" CD in 1996. Whatever the case, it's very 1950s hi-fi!

For another Cha Cha take on "Jingle Bells," we jump all the way to 2004 with this instrumental by Big Bad Voodoo Day from their album "Everything You Want for Christmas":

Cool take!

And here's a version from from the David Ricard Big Band's 2015 album "Holiday Swingin'":

Good to know the Cha Cha is still around!