The song was written by Berlin for the musical film Holiday Inn , released in Since its release, "White Christmas" has been covered by multiple artists, with the version sung by Bing Crosby being the world's best-selling single with estimated sales in excess of 50 million copies worldwide. Accounts vary as to when and where Berlin wrote the song. One day he told his secretary, "I want you to take down a song I wrote over the weekend. Not only is it the best song I ever wrote, it's the best song anybody ever wrote. He just said "I don't think we have any problems with that one, Irving. The song established that there could be commercially successful secular Christmas songs [11] —in this case, written by a Jewish immigrant to the United States. Lankford, Jr. However, "the popular culture industry had not viewed the themes of home and hearth, centered on the Christmas holiday, as a unique market" until after the success of "White Christmas" and the film where it appeared, Holiday Inn.


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Year after year, artists and songwriters have been trying to go one better than Bing Crosby. Crosby made an almost identical version in because the original master tape had worn out, as the single had been constantly re-pressed to meet with demand. When writing a song, Berlin generally hummed the tune and dictated the words. Berlin was just five year old when his parents and eight siblings moved to America in
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The song had been created by the prolific songwriter Irving Berlin in January Its nostalgic view of an ideal snowy northeastern Christmas had to wait until the August release of the movie Holiday Inn before its popularity could take off. How did a secular Christmas song written by a Jewish Russian immigrant become one of the most important wartime songs?
It may not have been a huge box-office hit like How the Grinch Stole Christmas , and it may not have made you bawl quite like Love Actually , but White Christmas is still considered one of the most beloved Christmas movies of all time — and for good reason. This musical film centers around a group of entertainers during World War II keen on spreading the holiday spirit to save a failing Vermont inn. Behind this Christmas flick are a bunch of super interesting facts about the actors, set, and storyline that are bound to make you love the year-old classic even more than you already do. So go on and scroll through this list of White Christmas facts — in no time, you'll be a total trivia whiz. Many folks assume that the titular track " White Christmas " originally came from the movie with the same name.