The Intro
After 20 years in the music business, US pop crooner Johnny Mathis finally scored a UK number 1, and the all-important Christmas spot too, with a timely ballad many associate with the festive season. It’s a throwback to the stately Christmas songs of old.
Before
John Royce Mathis was born in Gilmer, Texas on 30 September 1935, of African-American and Native American heritage. The family soon moved to San Franciso, California, which is where he grew up. His father Clem was a singer and pianist, and could see his fourth of seven sons had musical talent. He bought him an old piano for the princely sum of $25. In years to come his parents would run his fan club. Soon, Mathis was singing and dancing for visitors, at school and church. From the ages 13 to 18 he was given singing lessons.
But Mathis had other interests in his youth too. He was a star athlete at George Washington High School, excelling at the high jump, hurdles and basketball. At San Francisco State College in 1954 he set a high jump record that was only 7cm short of the 1952 Olympic record.
Around this time Mathis got to know Helen Noga, co-owner of The Black Hawk Club where he often performed. She became his manager in 1955 and was offered a contract with Columbia Records. He had to decide whether to sign or try out for the Olympics. On his father’s advice he chose the former and released his eponymous jazz-flavoured debut LP in 1956. His first single, Wonderful! Wonderful! followed in 1957 and was a number 14 hit in the US.
It was only the start, as It’s Not for Me to Say peaked at five and then Chances Are topped the US chart. It was followed by The Twelfth of Never, reaching nine. It later became a number 1 for Donny Osmond in 1973. A hugely successful year was rounded off with Wild is the Wind, later covered beautifully by David Bowie on Station to Station. It was the theme to a film of the same name and earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song in 1958. He repeated this achievement with A Certain Smile the following year, which peaked at four in the UK.
Mathis also released Johnny’s Greatest Hits in 1958, which is considered the first of its kind and it held the record for most consecutive weeks in the Billboard album chart until The Dark Side of the Moon overtook it in 1983. Mathis rounded off the year with his first Christmas single, Winter Wonderland, a number 17 hit on these shores. Someone was a number six UK smash in 1959. When My Love for You climbed to nine a year later, it became his last UK chart entry for 15 years.
Relations between Mathis and Noja soured and in 1964 they fought in court. He bought a mansion in Hollywood Hills that had been built by Howard Hughes, and he still owns it to this day. In 1967 Mathis established Jon Mat Records but the 60s were a lean time for his career thanks to the British Invasion. He was no longer fashionable, though he did try to appear more hip by covering Simon & Garfunkel’s The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin’ Groovy) and the theme from Midnight Cowboy, both in 1969.
The 70s looked to be going the same way with covers of The Bee Gees’ How Can You Mend a Broken Heart? in 1971 and The Walker Brothers’ former number 1 Make It Easy on Yourself in 1972 making little impression. But then in 1975 he made a surprise return to the hit parade with a cover of I’m Stone in Love with You by The Stylistics and When a Child is Born (Soleado) topped them all on Christmas Day 1976.
The bracketed part of the title is where the tune originated. Soleado was a mainly instrumental song composed in 1974 by Ciro Dammico, aka Zacar, and Dario Baldan Bembo. Soleado was adapted and transformed into various different songs depending on the country, including in the UK, where Vera Lynn sang a version called There Comes a Day in 1975. Fred Jay, who later co-wrote hits for Boney M, was responsible for the English lyrics that Mathis made famous.
Review
So is When a Child is Born (Soleado) a Christmas song or not? Strictly speaking, no. You can easily take the lyrics and say they’re a retelling of the Nativity, with a child’s birth bringing about a ‘brand new morn’ and talk of ‘walls of doubt, crumble tossed and torn’. It all sounds very much like the miraculous birth of Jesus, particularly the reference to ‘A tiny star lights up way up high.’ As it was on my cash-in The Best Christmas Album in the World… Ever!, I’ve considered it for the season for well over 20 years. But upon re-reading the words, it seems to me it’s telling us we’re still waiting for someone to be born that can make the world a better place. It becomes clearer when Mathis recites the spoken word section:
‘And all of this happens because the world is waiting,
Waiting for one child
Black, white, yellow, no-one knows
But a child that will grow up and turn tears to laughter,
Hate to love, war to peace and everyone to everyone’s neighbour
And misery and suffering will be words to be forgotten, forever’
Ouch, that ‘yellow’ bit has aged badly hasn’t it? But the intention was well-meant I’m sure. So yes, Mathis is waiting expectantly for someone to come along and save us all. Personally, the child this song reminds me of is my eldest daughter Emmie, who was due to arrive around Christmas 2011. I love a good croon when the moment and song is right, and still sometimes belt out ‘You’re on solid ground’ triumphantly.
When a Child is Born (Soleado) is a step back to the easy listening of the past, and you can bet the older generation were glad to have a Christmas number 1 that wasn’t by those glam rock upstarts for a change. While I prefer the festive classics of Slade and Mud, I’ve room in my heart for this too. Mathis is a class performer. Just ignore, as is so often the case for me, the spoken word section.
After
Although 1977 was another sparse year for hits, Mathis enjoyed another comeback a year later thanks to a duet with Deniece Williams (herself a number 1 artist in 1977 with Free) when Too Much, Too Little, Too Late became a US chart-topper. Mathis was encouraged by this to record many more duets, with, among others, Dionne Warwick and Natalie Cole. 1979 saw Mathis nominated for a third Oscar, this time for The Last Time I Felt Like This, recorded with Jane Olivor.
In 1981 Mathis tried to update his sound and recorded an LP with Chic’s Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards, but I Love My Lady remained unreleased until the mammoth 68-disc box set The Voice of Romance: The Columbia Original Album Collection in 2017. His last hit was Friends in Love with Warwick, released in 1982.
Despite the sales dwindling, he did release material sporadically over the next few decades. Mathis has, along with Bob Dylan, Barbra Streisand, Tony Bennett, Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen, the longest tenure on the Columbia label. He reduced his number of live performances in 2000 but still gets out there, now aged 85. In 2003 he was awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and has been entered into its Hall of Fame three times.
Proving it’s never too late to change course, Mathis released a country album, Let It Be Me: Mathis in Nashville. A Christmas album, Sending You a Little Christmas followed in 2013, and his last collection so far is Johnny Mathis Sings the Great New American Songbook (2017), where he tried his hand at modern hits by Adele and Pharrel Williams. After years of rumours, Mathis came out the year of its release. A survivor of alcohol and prescription drug problems, he’s done lots of commendable work for charity.
The Outro
Well, 1976 was a slog wasn’t it? Glam rock is no more and disco isn’t hitting the upper reaches as much as I’d like yet. Unfortunately 1977 is similar, but I can see at least one classic to come… perhaps the greatest number 1 of all time…
The Info
Written by
Zacar & Dario Baldan Bembo/Fred Jay (English lyrics)
Producer
Jack Gold
Weeks at number 1
3 (25 December 1976-14 January 1977)
Trivia
Births
1 January 1977: Labour MP Rosena Allin-Khan
10 January: Sinn Féin leader Michelle O’Neill
11 January: Cricketer Billy Taylor – 11 January
13 January: Actor Orlando Bloom
Deaths
14 January 1977: Conservative Prime Minister Anthony Eden – 14 January 1977
Meanwhile…
3 January 1977: Home Secretary Roy Jenkins announces he is leaving the House of Commons to become President of the European Commission.
6 January: EMI terminates its contract with the Sex Pistols after only one single, Anarchy in the U.K. This was in response to the band’s infamous appearance on Bill Grundy’s Today in December and incident two days previous at London Heathrow Airport.