You can't visit the stores during Christmas without hearing “Feliz Navidad,” “Santa Claus is Coming to Town,” or Mariah Carey's “All I Want for Christmas is You.” But it is completely different when it comes to songs for Easter, reports The Conversation magazine. The situation is as valid in Romania as it is in the West.
While Christmas music is everywhere in stores during the winter holidays, Easter has yet to find its commercial soundtrack.
The associations of Easter in Christianity are not as commercially compelling as those of Christmas. The commercialization of Christmas, which became more pronounced in Western department stores in the early 20th century, has meant that almost no one now questions religiously themed carols in shopping malls.
We don't mind celebrating the birth of a child, regardless of our beliefs. It is a joyous human experience. But the torture and death of a man on Good Friday is deeply disturbing, “and the triumphant Easter resurrection leaves advertisers speechless,” writes The Conversation.
Easter songs that failed
The 1977 composition “The Easter Bunny is Comin' to Town” by Maury Laws and Jules Bass is almost unknown, unlike their 1934 mega-hit “Santa Claus is Coming to Town”.
A more enduring secular Easter hit (though still not widely known in the West either) is “Easter Parade,” the 1933 song by American composer Irving Berlin. The lyrics describe walking down Fifth Avenue in New York, showing off the best clothes.
A 1948 recording for the film of the same name reversed the gender roles, with Judy Garland admiring the beauty of Fred Astaire in his Easter hat.
In 1950, Gene Autry (first to record “Frosty the Snowman”) tried the Easter music market with his cover of “Here Comes Peter Cottontail.”
Vocal stars followed suit, with Nat King Cole singing “Easter Sunday Morning” and Rosemary Clooney performing “Eggbert The Easter Egg.”
The US music industry tried to create a commercial soundtrack for Easter, but it wasn't one that caught on enough to be played in stores over the Easter holidays.
Success was so limited that even music industry executives gave up almost entirely. The makers of the 2011 children's film “Hop” tried to find a way again. They took “I Want Candy”, a 1965 hit popular in the US, and adapted it to be about chocolate.
The result is equally debatable.
