Merry Christmas (Andy Williams album) "Winter Wonderland", in 1934. Judy Garland reached number 27 with "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas" upon the release of the 1944 film "Meet Me in St. Louis", in which she performs it. "Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!" by Vaughn Monroe & His Orchestra spent five weeks at number one that began in December 1945. And Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops Orchestra took "Sleigh Ride" to number 24 on the Best Selling Pop Singles chart in 1949. The recording of "Silver Bells" by Bing Crosby and Carol Richards was first released in 1950 but did
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas "October Road"), and Luther Vandross (in "This Is Christmas"). In 1963, Frank Sinatra's third recording of the song, backed by popular Hollywood arranger Gus Levene and his orchestra, was controversially used by director Carl Foreman in his anti-war film "The Victors" as the soundtrack backdrop (along with the carol "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing") to the execution by firing squad of a G.I. deserter in a bleak, snowy field on Christmas Eve – a scene inspired by the real-life execution of Pvt. Eddie Slovik in 1945. "The New York Times" film reviewer, while recognising the power of the scene, complained