All it took was a heat wave in July 1946 for composer Leroy Anderson to come up with the song “Sleigh Ride”. Then BOOM! You have Arthur Fiedler’s Boston Pops first performing it on May 4, 1948. And it’s all fully enjoyable from there.

A few years later in 1950 Mitchell Parish came up with the great idea of adding lyrics and suddenly we were enjoying coffee and pumpkin pie at Farmer Gray’s birthday party. You know, it’s nearly like a picture print by Currier and Ives. Which is one of the things I love about it the most. You can close your eyes and listen to this piece and picture yourself on a sleigh ride, then stopping to have fun and warm up at an old farmhouse. It’s so Christmasy!

Fun facts about this song: ASCAP named it the most popular piece of music in the U.S. between 2009 and 2012 based on performance data from over 2,500 radio stations. Anderson’s recording remains the most popular instrumental version, while Johnny Mathis‘s has become the most popular vocal version.

Yes, the Leroy Anderson version of this song is my favorite but my second favorite is Bob Rivers’ “Flu Ride”.

I’ll also add that it’s origination is entirely based in Massachusetts: Anderson was born in Cambridge, MA and the song was first performed by the Boston Pops. Yeah! Another feather in our Masscaps!