Get into the spirit with the ultimate Christmas classic: Donny Hathaway’s “This Christmas.” His soulful vocals, the lush strings, and those iconic horns make this 1970 masterpiece the sound of the holidays for generations of music lovers. Christmas isn’t Christmas until you hear Donny!
Donny Hathaway – This Christmas
Album: Soul Christmas
First Released as a Single on December 9, 1970 by ATCO Records
Written By Donny Hathaway (as “Donny Pitts”) and Nadine Theresa McKinnor
Performed By
Donny Hathaway: Vocals, keyboard, bass
Phil Upchurch: Electric guitar
Morris Jennings: Drums
Ric Powell: Drums, bass drum, congas, sleigh bells
Willie Henderson: Baritone saxophone:
Louis Satterfield: Trombones
Arranged By Donny Hathaway
Produced by Donny Hathaway, Ric Powell
Recorded at Audio Finishers Studio in Chicago, IL in 1970
About Donny Hathaway:
Donny Hathaway, as multitalented and ambitious as any pop musician of the post- WW II era, collected kudos for his skills and creativity at lead, duet, and backup singing, keyboard playing, songwriting, and arranging. Born in Chicago in 1945, he grew up in St. Louis, Missouri, where his grandmother, a professional gospel singer, raised him. Under her tutelage and going by the stage name Donny Pitts, he performed in church. Matriculating at Washington, D.C.’s Howard University on a fine arts scholarship in 1963, Hathaway roomed with drummer Ric owell and joined his eponymous trio. The pair left Howard short of graduation to hire on at Chicago’s Curtom Records, founded by Curtis Mayfield. At Curtom, Hathaway emerged as a jack of all musical trades well-connected to the era’s hitmakers. In 1969, in a move facilitated by artist/producer King Curtis, he signed with Atco Records. He and another Howard roommate, Leroy Hutson, wrote “The Ghetto, Part I,” released as a single and later included on his Atco debut LP, the now-classic Everything Is Everything. He broadened his fandom singing behind fellow Howard alum and label mate Roberta Flack on her cover of “Killing Me Softly With His Song.” His 1971 LP Donny Hathaway further advanced his reputation. For a third Atco LP, Hathaway teamed with Flack on Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway, an LP of duets whose ranks yielded a massive hit single in “Where Is The Love.” In 1978 the pair returned to the charts with “The Closer I Get To You.” Hathaway and Flack were working on a second collection of duets when Hathaway, who had recorded two tracks toward the project despite being waylaid by mental illness, took his own life on January 13, 1979. He was 33. Flack posthumously released Robert Flack Featuring Donny Hathaway. – Michael Dolan
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