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| Label = | Writer = Irving Berlin | Producer = | Certification = | Chronology = | Last single = "Be Careful, It's My Heart" (1942) | This single = "White Christmas" (1942) | Next single = "Moonlight Becomes You" (1942) }} "White Christmas" is an Irving Berlin song reminiscing about an old-fashioned Christmas setting. According to the ''Guinness World Records'', the version sung by Bing Crosby is the best-selling single of all time, with estimated sales in excess of 100 million copies worldwide.〔http://www.pjstar.com/article/20141031/Entertainment/141039841〕 Other versions of the song, along with Bing Crosby's, have sold over 150 million copies.〔〔(Guinness Book of Records, 2007 Edition, page 187 )〕〔(Guinness Book of Records, 2008 Edition, page 181 )〕〔(Guinness Book of Records, 2009 Edition, pages 14, 15 & 169 )〕〔 Accounts vary as to when and where Berlin wrote the song. One story is that he wrote it in 1940, in warm La Quinta, California, while staying at the La Quinta Hotel, a frequent Hollywood retreat also favored by writer-director-producer Frank Capra, although the Arizona Biltmore also claims the song was written there. He often stayed up all night writing — he told his secretary, "Grab your pen and take down this song. I just wrote the best song I've ever written — heck, I just wrote the best song that anybody's ever written!"〔(White Christmas )〕 ==Bing Crosby version== The first public performance of the song was by Bing Crosby, on his NBC radio show ''The Kraft Music Hall'' on Christmas Day, 1941; a copy of the recording from the radio program is owned by the estate of Bing Crosby and was loaned to ''CBS News Sunday Morning'' for their December 25, 2011, program.〔 He subsequently recorded the song with the John Scott Trotter Orchestra and the Ken Darby Singers for Decca Records in just 18 minutes on May 29, 1942, and it was released on July 30 as part of an album of six 78-rpm discs from the film ''Holiday Inn''.〔〔 At first, Crosby did not see anything special about the song. He just said "I don't think we have any problems with that one, Irving."〔 - ("White Christmas" (p. 6) )〕 The song initially performed poorly and was overshadowed by ''Holiday Inns first hit song: "Be Careful, It's My Heart".〔 By the end of October 1942, "White Christmas" topped the "Your Hit Parade" chart. It remained in that position until well into the new year.〔 It has often been noted that the mix of melancholy — "just like the ones I used to know" — with comforting images of home — "where the treetops glisten" — resonated especially strongly with listeners during World War II. The Armed Forces Network was flooded with requests for the song. The recording is noted for Crosby's whistling during the second Chorus.〔 In 1942 alone, Crosby's recording spent eleven weeks on top of the ''Billboard'' charts. The original version also hit number one on the Harlem Hit Parade for three weeks, Crosby's first-ever appearance on the black-oriented chart. Re-released by Decca, the single returned to the #1 spot during the holiday seasons of 1945 and 1946 (on the chart dated January 4, 1947), thus becoming the only single with three separate runs at the top of the U.S. charts. The recording became a chart perennial, reappearing annually on the pop chart twenty separate times before ''Billboard'' magazine created a distinct Christmas chart for seasonal releases. Following its prominence in the musical ''Holiday Inn'', the composition won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1942. In the film, Bing Crosby sings "White Christmas" as a duet with actress Marjorie Reynolds, though her voice was dubbed by Martha Mears. This now-familiar scene was not the moviemakers' initial plan. In the script as originally conceived, Reynolds, not Crosby, would sing the song. The song would feature in another Crosby film — the 1954 musical ''White Christmas'' — becoming the highest-grossing film of 1954. The version most often heard today is not the original 1942 Crosby recording, as the master had become damaged due to frequent use. Crosby re-recorded the track on March 18, 1947, accompanied again by the Trotter Orchestra and the Darby Singers, with every effort made to reproduce the original recording session.〔 There are subtle differences in the orchestration, most notably the addition of a celesta and flutes to brighten up the introduction. Crosby dismissed his role in the song's success, saying later that "a jackdaw with a cleft palate could have sung it successfully." But Crosby was associated with it for the rest of his career. The 1947 version is heard in the 2004 movie, The Polar Express 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「White Christmas (song)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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