What is the highest-selling Christmas song of all time?
As a songwriter, there’s no more desired golden goose than writing a Christmas song, a festive hit which continues to be a strong revenue supply on an annual basis. If you’re lucky enough, you’ll never have to work again, and in some cases, neither will any future generations of your family.
According to a 2013 report from the Performing Right Society, the Slade single ‘Merry Xmas Everybody’ makes a staggering £512,000 per year. Frontman Noddy Holder and Jim Lea wrote the track, and in 2016, the latter revealed to the Daily Mail their collective annual earnings were closer to a million than the previously reported figure, proving how lucrative the festive market can be for artists.
However, if the performer of the track isn’t also the writer of the effort, their profits can be diminished. For example, Shakin’ Stevens is only estimated to make between £5,000 to £10,000 per year for ‘Merry Christmas Everyone’. Meanwhile, the song’s writer Bob Heatlie is estimated to earn a six-figure sum.
A report by The Independent states ‘White Christmas’, which was recorded by Bing Crosby in 1942, still generates £300,000 every year. ‘White Christmas’ isn’t only the highest-selling Christmas song of all time, having sold a staggering 50 million copies, but it’s also the highest-selling single of all time worldwide.
The nearest competition for Crosby’s crown is Elton John with ‘Candle In The Wind’, which has sold 32 million copies. Regarding Christmas songs, Mariah Carey’s ‘All I Want For Christmas For You’ is the second highest-selling record at 16 million sales.
Although Crosby sang ‘White Christmas’, the track was written by Izzy Baline, under the pen name of Irving Berlin, who performed as a singing waiter in New York’s Chinatown. Fascinatingly, Berlin was of the Jewish faith, and when asked why he wrote a song celebrating Christmas, he simply said: “I wrote it as an American”. Berlin was only five years old when he moved to the United States with his family in 1893, and his story embodies the American dream.
After hitting the top spot in 1942 at Christmas, ‘White Christmas’ also went to number one in 1945 and 1947. Remarkably, the song was a permanent fixture on the Billboard charts every year until 1963, when its heroic streak finally ended.
In Mark Steyn’s book, A Song for the Season, Berlin’s daughter explained: “My father believed in the secular American Christmas. There’s a lot of controversy about that, about whether there should be, apart from the Christian celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ, a general festive celebration that anyone can join in with.”
Unlike other Christmas songs of the era, ‘White Christmas’ didn’t have a traditional Christian theme. This likely explains its enduring appeal as the world transitioned into a multi-cultural, secular space and why ‘White Christmas’ still gets played today.
