Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

Hugh Martin and Ralph Blane wrote it in 1943 for the MGM musical Meet Me in St. Louis, where Judy Garland, as Esther, sings it on Christmas Eve to comfort her little sister, upset that the family is leaving St. Louis for New York. Martin’s first draft was bleaker — it told the child this might be their last Christmas together — and Garland, her co-star Tom Drake and the director Vincente Minnelli persuaded him to lighten it. Garland’s Decca record reached number 27 in 1944 and became a favorite with American troops. Martin later said he alone had written both words and music of the film’s songs and let Blane share the credit, and for Frank Sinatra’s 1957 A Jolly Christmas he changed “muddle through somehow” to a line about hanging a shining star; both versions are sung today.