We Almost Missed "Santa Clause Coming To Town"

On this episode of Christmas Merry and Bright, Raymond Arroyo, an award-winning broadcaster, New York Times best-selling author and acclaimed vocalist, unveils the hidden backstory of "Santa Clause Is Coming To Town" and how it was originally written from a place of tragedy.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I'm Raymond Arroyo, and this is a very special presentation Christmas.
Mary and Bright play Backstories. We're revealing the origins, the
backstories of some of the most beloved Christmas songs of
all time. I want to leave you with a couple
of origin stories that are kind of heartwarming, and I
did not record either of them for my Christmas album

(00:21):
Mary and Bright, but maybe next year. Likewhiite Christmas, this
next song is among the most upbeaaten happy of the
Christmas season, but it was written from a place of tragedy.
The song Santa Claus Is Coming to Town was written
by James Haven Gillespie, but Santa hadn't visited Gillespie in
a long time. In nineteen thirty four, Gillespie was a

(00:44):
down and out Vaudvillian who had turned to songwriting to
make ends meet. His brother had just died, and then
he got a call a request from Eddie Canter, who
was then a popular figure on the radio Vautvillion himself.
He wanted a Christmas song for his radio show. Gillespie
was too depressed by the death of his brother to

(01:06):
write a happy Christmas tune, but he recalled a subway
ride with his brother when he was younger, and his
mom warning that Santa sees you, and that made him
change his mind. He wrote the lyrics on the back
of an envelope in fifteen minutes. Then he got composer
John Coots to write the tune. When Eddie Cantor got

(01:28):
the song, he thought it was too childish and he
had to be convinced to perform it by his wife.
In nineteen thirty four, Missus Canter won the argument and
Eddie Canter performed Santa Claus Is Coming to Town. It
was an instant hit. Santa did come to Town for
James Gillespie as well. Hundreds of thousands of copies of

(01:48):
the sheet music sold overnight. The song made him a millionaire. Interestingly,
Canter never recorded the song.