In 1966,
Dean Martin
was at the top of his game and near the peak of his stardom when he decided to give his fans a gift for the holidays.
The Dean Martin Christmas Album
featured ten songs of the season, interpreted by
Martin
in his trademark full-bodied but easygoing style, with his longtime studio sidekicks
Jimmy Bowen
(producer) and
Bill Justis
and
Ernie Freeman
(arrangers) helping to give the music the right Yuletide glow.
was the only holiday album
recorded during his nearly two-decade tenure with
Reprise Records
, and became a perennial favorite of fans of the legendary barroom crooner. [In 2006, a re-sequenced version of
was released under the title
My Christmas Album
; the album was given a CD reissue in its original running order in 2017.] ~ Mark Deming