BWW CD Review: Kristin Chenoweth HAPPINESS IS... CHRISTMAS! is a Glorious Addition to Your Holiday CD Collection

After seeing Kristin Chenoweth slay at The Metropolitan Opera this month, I went home and called up her new holiday album HAPPINESS IS... CHRISTMAS!, only to discover that the album, while featuring many of the songs from the Met concert, is a very different listening experience... which it should be, and thank goodness. A singer can't just stand in a recording booth and sing the way they do when they are on stage, and a lot of singers - especially musical theater singers - don't recognize the need to pull in, so as not to blow out the speakers on the car stereo (or your eardrums, if listening by blue tooth). Because Ms. Chenoweth is a savvy singer and a world-class entertainer, she knows which voice to put on and on which occasions to do so - so while the Met concert was full of energy and electricity, the Chenoweth holiday album is full of intimacy and intellect.

Happiness Is... Christmas! starts out with a nod to her Tony Award honored performance in the Broadway musical You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown (obviously) and Kristin was, luckily, able to get the powers that be to agree to a modified lyric for the song "Happiness," in order to make it fit the holiday theme. Some of the lyrics are a little hokey but love for the holidays and for Kristin goes a long way toward letting go of any criticism that one might, initially, feel; the important thing is that the performance of the opening cut on the album is so rich with nostalgia and with honesty from the singing actress, that it whets the appetite for the rest of the CD, twelve tracks in total, ranging from bright and bouncy (a big band infused mashup of "The Man with the Bag" and "Jingle Bell Rock") to thoughtful and tender (Stephen Schwartz's "We Are Lights," an album highlight). Ms. Chenoweth's range is on full display as she delivers the Broadway belt for which she is so famous but also as she performs sweetly and quietly in the full-on radio-ready ballad "The Stories That You Told," a recording that might be lost on some of the younger people in the house this Christmas Day, but that will resonate with every person old enough to have a sense of nostalgia around the holidays. It's a particularly moving moment on the album, one that is vastly different from Chenoweth's 2008 holiday album "A Lovely Way to Spend Christmas" - the earlier CD is a good one but reflective of Chenoweth's youth as an artist, while this newer offering is a great one informed by the fact that Kristin has a solid knowledge of who she is an artist, as a woman, and as an entertainment industry leader. People listening to Happiness Is... Christmas! are people who look up to Chenoweth for the role she has played (and continues to play) as a public figure to whom people look for inspiration. Here, she inspires.

Among the various moods created by Kristin on the album is a new one, a sexier one, and one that serves as a perfect counterpoint to the spiritual music on the CD. Chenoweth is well known for her faith, a part of her life that she has never been shy about, and yet the more religious compositions on the CD happily avoid sounding preachy or treacly; in the meantime, her sexy and sultry duet of "Merry Christmas Baby" with blues icon Keb' Mo' is a side to Kristin Chenoweth that is most welcome as the newly-engaged fifty-three-year-old (as announced from the stage at The Met), represents the women, the men, and the gender non-conforming people of the world who are no longer kids and who want a snifter of brandy on Christmas, rather than a peppermint latte.

Also noteworthy on the album is a non-pretentious rendition of a famous Christmas song originated by Judy Garland, but, for this writer, the definite standouts are a straight-forward and extremely emotional "Merry Christmas Darling" that makes the song Kristin's, completely, and a gorgeous "My Dear Acquaintance" that will send every grown up into the New Year with a resolution to call their old friends more often, and spend time nurturing their new acquaintances, for the importance of friends resonates more these days than it has in many a year. Kristin Chenoweth's gift to all - aside from this truly lovely holiday album - is this one track that will help us all stay a little more grounded and focused as we approach the uncertainty of what comes next. That message that will come as this album draws to a close, is the reminder that the nurturing of friendships is paramount. With this record, Kristin Chenoweth has been a good friend to us all.

Kristin Chenoweth HAPPINESS IS... CHRISTMAS is a 2021 release on the Concord Records label. It is available on all digital platforms and at the Kristin Chenoweth website HERE.

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