I'll be Home for Christmas

Bing Crosby recorded 'I'll Be Home for Christmas' in 1943 and it instantly topped the charts as the one of America's most popular holiday songs along with 'White Christmas'. James 'Kim' Gannon wrote its lyrics while its music was composed by Walter Kent. It touched the hearts of the soldiers and civilians alike who were still going through World War II and made Crosby earn his fifth gold record. In December 1965, when the astronauts Frank Borman and James Lovell were returning to Earth after setting a record for the longest flight in the US space program aboard Gemini 7 spacecraft, they requested this carol to be played for them.

I'll be home for Christmas;
You can count on me.
Please have snow and mistletoe
And presents on the tree.

Christmas Eve will find me
Where the love-light gleams.
I'll be home for Christmas
If only in my dreams.

Carol of the Bells
Hark! How the bells
Sweet silver bells
All seem to say,

"Throw cares away."
Christmas is here
Bringing good cheer
To young and old
Meek and the bold

Ding, dong, ding, dong
That is their song
With joyful ring
All caroling
One seems to hear
Words of good cheer
From ev'rywhere
Filling the air

Oh how they pound,
Raising the sound,
O'er hill and dale,
Telling their tale,
Gaily they ring
While people sing
Songs of good cheer
Christmas is here
Merry, merry, merry, merry Christmas
Merry, merry, merry, merry Christmas

On, on they send
On without end
Their joyful tone
To ev'ry home
(repeat from the beginning)

Ding, dong, ding, dong.