“This Christmas” – Donny Hathaway (Atco/Atlantic – 1970)
Brother Hathaway, along with Nadine McKinnor – a lady who came by the studio to clean the drapes and wound up composing a classic – co-wrote one of the first and most enduring original Soul Holiday classics with the scene setting “This Christmas.” The lyrics detail a couple’s first Christmas set to a bluster of majestic soul and a beat that shifts between bars of 4 and 3. Many subsequent recordings cheat the rhythmic counterpoint here but Donny’s tympani and bells lay down the yuletide law. If you don’t catch the spirit off of Donny’s outro ad libs, your name is either Scrooge or Grinch. The B-side, “Be There,” is also a Christmas gem.
