Merry Christmas, Baby (album)

Merry Christmas, Baby is the first Christmas album by Rod Stewart and his 27th studio album overall, released on 30 October 2012.^[1] The album has proved to be a top 10 success in many countries including the UK, US, Canada and Australia. It was certified Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America in November 2012 with over 1,000,000 copies sold in the US.^[2]

Merry Christmas, Baby
Studio album by Rod Stewart
Released	30 October 2012
Genre	Christmas soul jazz
Length	46:04
Label	Verve
Producer	David Foster Rod Stewart Kevin Savigar
Rod Stewart chronology
Fly Me to the Moon... The Great American Songbook Volume V (2010) Merry Christmas, Baby (2012) Time (2013)

Critical reception

Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	53/100[3]
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[4]
BBC Music	(positive)[5]
The Guardian	[6]
The Independent	[7]
NME	3/10[8]
Slant Magazine	[9]

Merry Christmas, Baby received mixed reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 53, which indicates "mixed or average reviews", based on 6 reviews.

Commercial performance

Merry Christmas, Baby debuted at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 album sales chart, with first week sales of 117,000 copies according to Nielsen SoundScan,^[10] and spent a total of eight weeks in the top 10.^[11] With total U.S. sales of 858,000 copies in 2012 according to SoundScan, Merry Christmas, Baby was the best-selling Christmas/holiday album of the year.^[12] The album was also the year's fifteenth best-selling album in the U.S. according to Billboard and the ninth best-selling physical album in the U.S. according to the Nielsen Company's 2012 Music Industry Report.^[13][14]

In the UK, the album debuted at No. 2 on the Official Albums Chart and has so far spent six weeks in the top 10.^[15] It sold 421,000 copies in the UK in 2012^[16] and its current UK sales stand at 636,000.^[17]

In Canada, the album spent eight weeks in the top ten of the Canadian Albums Chart, with three consecutive weeks at the No. 1 spot. It was the ninth best-selling album in Canada in 2012 according to year-end sales data from Nielsen SoundScan Canada with sales of 135,000.^[18]

Worldwide, the album achieved total 2012 sales of 2.6 million according to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, making it the seventh best-selling album of the year.^[19]

Track listing

• All tracks produced by David Foster; except "Auld Lang Syne" produced by Rod Stewart and Kevin Savigar.^[20]

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Length
1.	"Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas"	Hugh Martin, Ralph Blane	4:31
2.	"Santa Claus Is Coming to Town"	J. Fred Coots, Haven Gillespie	2:48
3.	"Winter Wonderland" (featuring Michael Bublé)	Felix Bernard, Richard B. Smith	2:26
4.	"White Christmas"	Irving Berlin	3:49
5.	"Merry Christmas, Baby" (featuring CeeLo Green & Trombone Shorty)	Johnny Moore, Lou Baxter	3:53
6.	"Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!" (featuring Dave Koz)	Sammy Cahn, Jule Styne	2:51
7.	"What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?" (featuring Ella Fitzgerald & Chris Botti)	Frank Loesser	3:43
8.	"Blue Christmas"	Billy Hayes, Jay W. Johnson	3:30
9.	"Red-Suited Super Man" (featuring Trombone Shorty)	Rod Stewart, David Foster, Amy Foster	3:11
10.	"When You Wish upon a Star"	Leigh Harline, Ned Washington	3:47
11.	"We Three Kings" (featuring Mary J. Blige)	John Henry Hopkins Jr.	3:27
12.	"Silent Night"	Franz Xaver Gruber, Joseph Mohr	4:24
13.	"Auld Lang Syne"	Traditional, Robert Burns	3:45
Total length:			46:04

Deluxe edition bonus tracks

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Length
14.	"What Child Is This?"	Traditional, William Chatterton Dix	4:17
15.	"The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire)"	Mel Tormé, Robert Wells	3:39
16.	"Silver Bells"	Jay Livingston, Ray Evans	3:25
Total length:			57:25

Note

• "What Are You Doing New Year's Eve" uses a vocal sample of the Ella Fitzgerald recording of the same name^[21]

Personnel

Main

• Rod Stewart – lead vocals, musical arrangements (11–13)
• Jochem van der Saag – synthesizer programming (1–12)
• David Foster – acoustic piano (1–3, 6–8, 10), keyboards (5, 9, 11–12), string arrangements (1, 3–4, 9–13), horn arrangements (2, 5–6, 8–9), musical arrangements (11–13)
• Kevin Savigar – keyboards (13), programming (13), musical arrangements (13)

Guest musicians

• Mary J. Blige – lead vocals (11)
• Chris Botti – trumpet solo (7)
• Michael Bublé – lead vocals (3)
• Ella Fitzgerald – sampled lead vocals (7)
• CeeLo Green – lead vocals (5)
• Dave Koz – saxophone solo (6)
• Trombone Shorty – trombone, trumpet (5, 9)

Additional vocalists

• Bridget Cady – backing vocals (5, 9)
• Mabvuto Carpenter – choir vocals (13)
• Angela Fisher – choir vocals (13), Gospel Choir contractor
• Kimberly Johnson – backing vocals (5, 9), choir vocals, choir contractor (13)
• Krystal Johnson – choir vocals (13)
• Bobbi Page – vocal contractor (12)
• Page LA Children's Choir – backing vocals (12)
• Dieyelle Reed – backing vocals (5, 9), choir vocals (13)
• Will Wheaton – choir vocals (13)
• Gospel Choir – Keith Allen, Bridget Cady, Bryan Terrell Clark, David Daughtry, Melanie Fontana, Holly Palmer, Dieyelle Reed, Brandon Winbush and Lucy Woodward

Additional instrumentalists

• Chris Walden – orchestra conductor (1, 3, 4, 8–13), trumpet (2, 6, 7), horn arrangements (2, 6, 7), string arrangements (3, 8, 9), trombone (7)
• Isobel Griffiths – orchestra contractor (1, 3, 4, 8–13)
• Dean Parks – guitar (1, 2, 3, 5–9, 11, 12), guitar solo (4, 10)
• Emerson Swinford – guitar (13)
• Chuck Berghofer – bass (1, 2, 6–8, 10)
• Peter Erskine – drums (1, 2, 7, 10)
• Matt O'Connor – percussion (2, 3, 5, 6, 9), additional percussion (11)
• Jeff Driskel – saxophone (2, 6, 7)
• Jimmy Roberts – saxophone solo (9)
• Tim McFatter – tenor saxophone (5, 9)
• Dan Oestreicher – baritone saxophone (5, 9)
• Bob McChesney – trombone (2, 6)
• Nathan Kelly – horn arranger (5)
• William Ross – string arrangements (1, 4, 10–13)
• J'Anna Jacoby – violin (13)

Production

• Producers – Rod Stewart (Tracks 1–13); David Foster (Tracks 1–12); Kevin Savigar (Track 13)
• Recorded by Don Murray, Jochem van der Saag and Jorge Vito
• Additional recording – Jack Miele
• Engineers – Jochem van der Saag and Jorge Vito
• Recorded at Chartmaker Studios, Henson Recording Studios, The Village Recorder, Satinwood Studio and Studio City Sound (Los Angeles); Garage Studios (Palm Beach, Florida); Echo Beach Studios (Jupiter, Florida); Fudge Recording Studio (New Orleans, Louisiana)
• Orchestra recorded by Jonathan Allen and Steve Price at Abbey Road Studios (London, England) and Angel Recording Studios (Islington, England)
• Choir recorded by Tom Weir at Studio City Sound
• Mixed by Jochem van der Saag at Blue Studios (Malibu, California)
• Mastered by Vlado Meller at Vlado Meller Mastering (Charleston, South Carolina)
• Art direction and design – Jullian Peploe Studio
• Photography – Penny Lancaster

Charts

Weekly charts Chart (2012) Peak position Australian Albums (ARIA)[22] 3 Austrian Albums (Ö3 Austria)[23] 5 Belgian Albums (Ultratop Flanders)[24] 30 Belgian Albums (Ultratop Wallonia)[25] 41 Canadian Albums (Billboard)[26] 1 Croatian International Albums (HDU)[27] 38 Danish Albums (Hitlisten)[28] 33 Dutch Albums (Album Top 100)[29] 6 German Albums (Offizielle Top 100)[30] 22 Hungarian Albums (MAHASZ)[31] 28 Irish Albums (IRMA)[32] 5 Italian Albums (FIMI)[33] 28 New Zealand Albums (RMNZ)[34] 1 Norwegian Albums (VG-lista)[35] 7 Polish Albums (ZPAV)[36] 16 Portuguese Albums (AFP)[37] 12 Scottish Albums (OCC)[38] 2 Spanish Albums (PROMUSICAE)[39] 20 Swedish Albums (Sverigetopplistan)[40] 2 Swiss Albums (Schweizer Hitparade)[41] 45 UK Albums (OCC)[42] 2 US Billboard 200[43] 3

Year-end charts Chart (2012) Position Australian Albums (ARIA)[44] 20 Dutch Albums (Album Top 100)[45] 96 Swedish Albums (Sverigetopplistan)[46] 16 UK Albums (OCC)[16] 14 US Billboard 200[47] 170 Chart (2013) Position Canadian Albums (Billboard)[48] 15 UK Albums (OCC)[49] 77 US Billboard 200[50] 26

Certifications

Region	Certification	Certified units/sales
Australia (ARIA)[51]	2× Platinum	140,000^
Canada (Music Canada)[52]	3× Platinum	240,000^
Ireland (IRMA)[53]	Platinum	15,000^
New Zealand (RMNZ)[54]	2× Platinum	30,000^
Poland (ZPAV)[55]	Gold	10,000*
United Kingdom (BPI)[56]	2× Platinum	636,000[17]
United States (RIAA)[2]	Platinum	1,000,000^
* Sales figures based on certification alone. ^ Shipments figures based on certification alone.

Awards and recognition

In February 2013, the album was nominated for a Canadian Juno Award in the International Album of the Year category.^[57]