Monday, December 23, 2019

EPs that deserve their own post--Mary Peacock's "It's Christmas Again" (1958)






Mary Peacock at 94.


Mary O'Kelley Peacock was born in 1905 and died in 2003 at the age of 98.  She left Meredith College (Raleigh, NC) in 1926 with a music degree, and her songs certainly sound like the work of someone who got a music degree in 1926.  That's simply to say that they have a very Twenties sound.

This six-selection EP is from 1958--see the RCA custom matrix prefix (J)--and it features the Music Department of the Women's Club of Moorestown, New Jersey.  I don't know if It's Christmas Again was the name of a short musical by Mary, or if it was composed for this disc.  I do know this is one of the most charming, unusual, and interesting holiday finds of my career.  And I love Peppermint Lane.  It's the ear worm of this posting season.  It's on constant rotation in my head.

This appears to have been written for a young audience, and I think it's the kind of thing a young audience would have liked.  A young audience of 1958, that is.  A modern one, likely no.





DOWNLOAD: It's Christmas Again (Mary Peacock)




Happy Birthday Little Christ Child
Little is the Lord
When Christ was Born in Bethlehem (Solo: Doris Hall)
It's Christmas Again
Peppermint Lane (Solo: Alice Eisemann)
If I Were Santa Claus


It's Christmas Again--Music Dept. of the Women's Club of Moorestown (NJ)  (RCA Custom J8OH-8109/8110; 1958)


Lee

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