''Christmas Portrait'' is the first

Christmas album Christmas music comprises a variety of genres of music regularly performed or heard around the Christmas season. Music associated with Christmas may be purely instrumental, or, in the case of carols or songs, may employ lyrics whose subject ma ...

and ninth studio album by the American popular music duo

Carpenters Carpentry is a skilled trade and a craft in which the primary work performed is the cutting, shaping and installation of building materials during the construction of buildings, ships, timber bridges, concrete formwork, etc. Carpenters tra ...

, released on October 13, 1978.

Background

The album includes a revised version of the duo's signature Christmas song, "

Merry Christmas Darling "Merry Christmas, Darling" is a Christmas song by the Carpenters (music by Richard Carpenter, lyrics by Frank Pooler), and originally recorded in 1970. It was first available on a 7-inch single that year (A&M Records 1236), and was later re-iss ...

", featuring re-recorded vocals by Karen Carpenter (done at her request). It also includes one of two versions of "

Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town "Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town" is a Christmas song featuring Santa Claus written by J. Fred Coots and Haven Gillespie. The earliest known recorded version of the song was by banjoist Harry Reser and his band on October 24, 1934. It was then s ...

" (a slower version, recorded in 1974, as well as other unused songs recorded during this album's sessions, were issued on the Carpenters' later Christmas album, ''

An Old-Fashioned Christmas ''An Old-Fashioned Christmas'' is the second Christmas album and posthumous twelfth studio album by American music duo Carpenters, released on October 26, 1984, and after the death of singer and drummer Karen Carpenter. Background The album pro ...

'').

Album artwork

The original album cover by Robert Tanenbaum is modeled on

Norman Rockwell Norman Percevel Rockwell (February 3, 1894 – November 8, 1978) was an American painter and illustrator. His works have a broad popular appeal in the United States for their reflection of Culture of the United States, the country's culture. Roc ...

's 1960 painting "Triple Self-Portrait", done as a cover for ''

The Saturday Evening Post ''The Saturday Evening Post'' is an American magazine, currently published six times a year. It was issued weekly under this title from 1897 until 1963, then every two weeks until 1969. From the 1920s to the 1960s, it was one of the most widely c ...

''.

CD reissues

The standard CD version of ''Christmas Portrait'', first issued in 1984, is a "Special Edition" compendium of selected tracks from the Carpenters' two Christmas albums into one 70-minute program, with tracks from each interspersed in the running order; "Ave Maria" was remixed at this time in order to include a choral track that vanished in 1978 and was later found. A CD of the original LP content was briefly issued exclusively in

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...

around the same time. In 1996, a two-CD set titled ''Christmas Collection'' was issued internationally, containing ''Christmas Portrait'' and ''An Old-Fashioned Christmas'' together with their original respective track listings.

Commercial performance

On April 16, 1998, ''Christmas Portrait'' was certified

Platinum Platinum is a chemical element with the symbol Pt and atomic number 78. It is a dense, malleable, ductile, highly unreactive, precious, silverish-white transition metal. Its name originates from Spanish , a diminutive of "silver". Platinu ...

by the

RIAA The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...

for shipment of one million copies in the United States since its 1978 release. In December 2011, ''Christmas Portrait: Special Edition'' re-entered the ''Billboard'' 200 album sales chart at No. 150 and eventually achieved a new chart peak position of No. 126. In December 2012 and then, in December 2013, the album again re-entered the ''Billboard'' 200 album sales chart and attained a new chart peak position of No. 114. In January 2019, it reached a new peak position of No. 67 on the ''Billboard'' 200. The original ''Christmas Portrait'' has not been available on its own in the US since the late-90's, when the cassette version was discontinued, so the chart action in the 2010s is for the 1984 compilation. In January 2020, it reached another new peak position of No. 56 on the ''Billboard'' 200. By the end of November 2014, ''Christmas Portrait'' was the twenty-third best-selling Christmas/holiday album in the U.S. during the

SoundScan Luminate (formerly Nielsen SoundScan, Nielsen Music Products, and MRC Data) is a provider of music sales data. Established by Mike Fine and Mike Shalett in 1991, data is collected weekly and made available every Sunday (for albums sales) and eve ...

era of music sales tracking (March 1991 to present), having sold 1,950,000 copies according to SoundScan.

Track listing

All lead vocals by

Karen Carpenter Karen Anne Carpenter (March 2, 1950 – February 4, 1983) was an American singer and drummer, who formed half of the sibling duo the Carpenters alongside her older brother Richard. With a distinctive three-octave contralto range, she was praise ...

, except where noted. Notes * signifies adapted by

Singles

"Merry Christmas Darling"

*US 7" single (1970) – A&M 1236 #"Merry Christmas Darling" #"Mr. Guder" *UK 7" single (1971) – AME601 #"Merry Christmas Darling" #" Ticket to Ride" #"Saturday" *UK 7" single (1990) – AM716 #"Merry Christmas Darling" #"

(They Long to Be) Close to You "(They Long to Be) Close to You" is a song written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David. The best-known version is that recorded by American duo the Carpenters for their second studio album '' Close to You'' (1970) and produced by Jack Daugherty. Rele ...

" *UK 7" single (1990) – AMS716 #"Merry Christmas Darling" #"(They Long to Be) Close to You" *UK 12" single (1990) – AMY716 #"Merry Christmas Darling" #"You're the One" #"(They Long to Be) Close to You" *UK CD single (1990) – AMCD716 #"Merry Christmas Darling" #"(They Long to Be) Close to You" #"You're the One"

"Christmas Song"

*US 7" single (1977) – A&M 1991 #"Christmas Song" #"Merry Christmas Darling" *JP 7" single (1977) – CM-2083 #"Christmas Song" #"Merry Christmas Darling" *JP CD single (1996) – PODM-1059 #"Christmas Song" #"Winter Wonderland/Silver Bells/White Christmas"

"Silent Night"

*JP 7" single (1978) – AMP 1012 #"Silent Night" #"Jingle Bells" #"Ave Maria"

"Ave Maria"

*JP CD single (1996) – PODM-1065 #"Ave Maria" #"Merry Christmas Darling"

Charts

References

External links

Richard Carpenter's review

1978 album at the Carpenters Recording Resource

1984 Special Edition at Carpenters Recording Resource
{{Authority control 1978 Christmas albums Christmas albums by American artists The Carpenters albums A&M Records albums Pop Christmas albums