A Charlie Brown Christmas

Vince Guaraldi/arr. Carl Strommen

A Charlie Brown Christmas presents four of Vince Guaraldi’s gentle jazz pieces from the prime-time animated TV specials based on Charles Schulz’s Peanuts comic strip. The first TV special, which featured Charlie Brown's search for meaning in an over-commercialized Christmas holiday, aired in 1965 and has become a holiday classic. Its success spawned many more animated specials, feature films and a Saturday morning cartoon. Tonight’s selections are “Linus and Lucy,” “Skating,” “Christmas Time Is Here,” and “O Tannenbaum.”

Composer Vince Guaraldi (1928 – 1976) was a San-Francisco-based jazz pianist and composer. Already known for his Grammy-winning tune “Cast Your Fate to the Wind,” he went on to score seventeen animated Peanuts television specials.

Arranger Carl Strommen (b.1940) is a graduate of City College of New York, and Long Island University where he teaches orchestration, arranging and composition.

Last updated on April 21, 2015 by Palatine Concert Band