White Christmas,
     by Irving Berlin

Ironically, the most popular American Christmas song was written by an immigrant Jew, Irving Berlin (born Israel Baline, the son of a poor cantor, in Temun, Siberia). The song was a set piece for the 1942 movie, "Holiday Inn", which starred Bing Crosby, Fred Astaire and Marjorie Reynolds. The story line of the movie provided opportunities for a song for each of the major holidays, so, for example, Fred Astaire dusted off "Easter Parade" for that segment. For the Christmas season, the directors decided a new song was needed, and Berlin wrote this "unusually chromatic sentimental ballad" (paraphrasing Groves’ Dictionary of Popular Music) to be sung by Crosby and Reynolds. The song won an Academy Award for 1942, and by some estimates is the most popular recording of all time, having sold well over 150 million copies in various versions. This arrangement by Mac Huff, with instrumental accompaniment by John Moss, dates from the 1990’s.