You've hung up your costumes and sorted through all your Halloween candy - now it's time to get excited for the holiday gift-giving season, packed with great reissues under your tree and spirited carols on the stereo. Two new vinyl products from Verve Records feature both: some of the most beloved holiday hits from two of the label's most iconic voices.

Verve will release a special gift set this season: Ella & Louis Wish You a Swinging Holiday - a 2LP set that brings together a bona fide Christmas classic LP from The First Lady, and a recently-assembled collection of Christmas cheer from Satchmo. Ella Fitzgerald Wishes You a Swinging Christmas was the singer's first album of holiday material, not to mention her first album of the 1960s. Recorded in the summer of 1960 with arrangements and conducting by the legendary Frank DeVol (a name you might know from the arrangement of Nat King Cole's "Nature Boy" or the themes to TV classics like The Brady Bunch and Family Affair), the album features Ella's inimitable instrument on renditions of "Jingle Bells," "The Christmas Song," "Winter Wonderland" and "What Are You Doing New Year's Eve."

Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong made beautiful music for Verve Records many times over, but a proper holiday album was never something assembled during the singer/trumpeter's lifetime. Verve added one to the nice list with 2022's Louis Armstrong Wishes You a Cool Yule. It featured a half-dozen holiday single sides recorded for Decca between 1952 and 1955 (including "Zat You Santa Claus," "Christmas in New Orleans" and "White Christmas"), some previously released duets with Ella Fitzgerald ("I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm") and Velma Middleton (a live version of "Baby, It's Cold Outside") and even the feel-good favorite "What a Wonderful World" - not a Christmas song, but always nice to hear in a familial season. The album closed with a fascinating rarity: a reading of Clement Clarke Moore's poem A Visit from Saint Nicholas - noted by experts as Armstrong's final recording before his passing in 1971 - with new piano accompaniment by Sullivan Fortner.

Ella & Louis Wish You a Swinging Holiday is packaged in a warmly-designed slipcase and - in a point of pride for The Second Disc team - features a light essay to set the holiday mood from our own Mike Duquette!

And for those looking for even more holiday cheer from Fitzgerald, Verve is also releasing to general retail a new 2LP deluxe edition of Swinging Christmas. It will feature a 12-track bonus disc featuring single cuts (a 1959 version of "The Christmas Song" with accompaniment by Russ Garcia and His Orchestra; a smattering of Ella's own seasonal sides for Decca), duets (one with Louis Jordan on "Baby, It's Cold Outside" and two with Armstrong, including the same version of "I've Got My Love..." on Cool Yule) and even some alternate takes from the Swinging Christmas sessions that were included on a 2002 CD reissue and are pressed on vinyl for the first time. The redesigned gatefold sleeve (featuring a gold-foil hue surrounding the original art) comes with a booklet featuring liner notes by writer Will Friedwald and a set of six cut-out ornaments inspired by the album and original promotion.

Both sets can be ordered now at the links below. As an Amazon affiliate, we earn from qualifying purchases.

Ella & Louis Wish You a Swinging Holiday (Verve, 2024)

LP 1: Ella Fitzgerald Wishes You a Swinging Christmas (originally released as Verve MG VS-64042, 1960)

Side A

1. Jingle Bells
2. Santa Claus is Coming to Town
3. Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
4. What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?
5. Sleigh Ride
6. The Christmas Song

Side B

1. Good Morning Blues
2. Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!
3. Winter Wonderland
4. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
5. Frosty the Snowman
6. White Christmas

LP 2: Louis Armstrong Wishes You a Cool Yule (originally released as Verve B0036221-01, 2022)

Side A

1. Cool Yule
2. Winter Wonderland
3. I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm (with Ella Fitzgerald)
4. Zat You Santa Claus
5. Christmas in New Orleans
6. White Christmas

Side B

1. Christmas Night in Harlem
2. Baby, It's Cold Outside (with Velma Middleton)
3. Moments to Remember
4. What a Wonderful World
5. Reading of A Visit from St. Nicholas (with Sullivan Fortner, piano accompaniment)

Tracks A1 and A4 released as Decca single 28943, 1953
Tracks A2 and A6 released as Decca single 28443, 1952
Track A3 released on Ella and Louis Again - Verve MG V-4006-2, 1957
Tracks A5 and B1 released as Decca single 29710, 1955
Track B2 released on The California Concerts - Decca Jazz GRD-4-613, 1992
Track B3 released on Decca single 29694, 1955
Track B4 released on ABC single 45-10982, 1967
Vocal of Track B5 released on Continental single CR 1001, 1971. Piano accompaniment is exclusive to this release.

Ella Fitzgerald Wishes You a Swinging Christmas (Deluxe Edition) (Verve, 2024) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

LP 1: Original album (same as above)

LP 2: Bonus material

Side C

1. The Secret of Christmas
2. We Three Kings of Orient Are / O Little Town of Bethlehem
3. Christmas Island
4. The Christmas Song (Alternative Take)
5. White Christmas (Alternative Take)
6. Frosty the Snowman (Alternative Take)

Side D

1. Holiday in Harlem
2. Baby, It's Cold Outside (with Louis Jordan)
3. Santa Claus Got Stuck (in My Chimney)
4. Gee, Baby, Ain't I Good to You (with Louis Armstrong)
5. I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm (with Louis Armstrong)
6. The Christmas Song (Single Version)

Track C1 and D6 released as Verve single 10186, 1959
Tracks C2 released on HMV U.K. single 45POP817, 1960
Tracks C3-C6 released on expanded CD edition - Verve 440 065 086-2, 2002
Track D1 released on Decca single 1521, 1938
Track D2 released on Decca single 24644, 1949
Track D3 released on Decca single 27255, 1950
Tracks D4-D5 released on Ella and Louis Again - Verve MG V-4006-2, 1957