ARTS&LIFE
MUSIC

R

aised Reform in the San
Fernando Valley near Los
Angeles, Dave Koz and his
family celebrated Chanukah every year
and didn’t have much in the way of
Christmas traditions.
“I’m making up for that now — big
time,
” Koz says now, with a laugh.
The Grammy Award-nominated
saxophonist is in the midst of his 27th
Annual Dave Koz & Friends Christmas
Tour, playing songs of the season for 19
nights around the country. It’s a tradi-
tion he loves, even if it’s not a tradition
he comes from.
“I love Christmas music,
” Koz,
61, says by phone from his home
in Beverly Hills, California. “These
songs, for the most part, not the reli-
gious ones, songs more like ‘White
Christmas’ and ‘Winter Wonderland’
— were all written during that
time period of The Great American
Songbook. In the same way that music
has stood the test of time, these songs
will be around forever. The guys who
wrote these songs were legendary song-
writers, and they knew how to do it.
It’s not lost on Koz, of course, that
some of those writers were Jewish as
well — “White Christmas” by Irving
Berlin, “Chestnuts Roasting on an
Open Fire” by Mel Torme, “Let It
Snow” by Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne,
“Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer”
and a slew of others by Johnny Marks.
It’s a long list, sometimes by commis-
sion, sometimes just for songs to sell,
but a significant portion of the pop-
ular Christmas playlist has a kind of
hechsher on it.
That’s true in popular music as
well. Besides Koz, performers such
as Barbra Streisand, Neil Diamond,
Barry Manilow, Carole King, Harry

Connick Jr. and Kenny G have released
Christmas albums — often more than
one.
“
A Christmas Gift For You from
Phil Spector” from 1963, meanwhile,
is a perennial favorite in the holiday
market.
“It’s interesting, isn’t it?” Diamond
said some years ago of the Jewish
Christmas music phenomenon. “I
love so many forms of music; there’s
hardly a form that I don’t love. And
these (Christmas) songs are some of
the greatest melodies ever written. It’s
a pleasure to sing songs that are that
beautiful.
”
When releasing “In the Swing of
Christmas,
” the jazz-flavored third of
his Christmas albums, Manilow noted
that, “I don’t do it as a religious thing at
all. I do it as a family-oriented album
— winter, family, feel-good time of the
year where everybody gets together
and stops hollering at each other.
”
He also lamented the comparative
lack of similar caliber repertoire for
Chanukah.
“If I could do (a Chanukah) album,
believe me, I would,
” says Manilow,
who’s staging his “
A Very Barry
Christmas” concerts in Las Vegas this
month. “But I look at my heritage
songs, and they are awful. What am I
gonna do — ‘Dreidel, Dreidel, Dreidel?’
It’s just not the same.
”
For Koz — who’s released seven hol-
iday albums since 1997’s “December
Makes Me Feel This Way” — the
Christmas tour ironically has a lot to
do with his upbringing.
“We always celebrated Chanukah in
our home — lit the candles at home,
eight nights, exchanged gifts and every-
thing,
” Koz recalls. “We never had a
Christmas tree, but maybe because it

Jewish Saxophonist Dave Koz continues
his Christmas Tour.
Jewish Saxophonist Dave Koz continues
Jewish Saxophonist Dave Koz continues

GARY GRAFF CONTRIBUTING WRITER

52 | DECEMBER 12 • 2024
J
N

Details
Dave Koz & Friends 27th Annual Christmas Tour, featuring Jonathan Butler,
Adam Hawley, Vincent Ingala and Rebecca Jade, plays at 7:30 p.m.
Sunday, Dec. 15, at Music Hall Center, 350 Madison Ave., Detroit.
(313) 887-8500 or musichall.org.

Saxophonist
Dave Koz
performs on
stage.

JACK COHEN