As of Dec. 18 the Mariah Carey Christmas classic "All I Want For Christmas Is You" landed on the red-hot Top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100. Quartz spoke with "Switched on Pop" podcast host and musicologist Nate Sloan and his co-host Charlie Harding about what could drive this powerful rise, year after year. Sloan says it is suspense of the harmonic kind.
<iframe width="620" height="349" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/yXQViqx6GMY" frameborder="0" gesture="media" allow="encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Because the song "All I Want For Christmas Is You" is written in the key of G Major, return to that "tonic" home base feels like a soothing resolution, Sloan described. Harding simplified the teasing of false cadences that seem like they will resolve but then don't, pointing out, "There are so many points in that chord progression where you think it's going to go back to where it started and instead she keeps dancing around it." This captures the essence of the suspense Sloan identified as the secret of Mariah Carey's Christmas tonic.
Whatever the reason, more than two decades after its release in 1994 the song is still becoming more popular. As long as Carey's upward trajectory continues, she seems destined to someday pass Bing Crosby's "White Christmas" for the top Christmas spot in total sales. But don't expect that day to come too soon, as Carey has 14 million sales so far, but Crosby has in excess of 50 million.
