Help needed! Songs for Thanksgiving?
I thought I’d call upon my American friends for some assistance. Now that we have an American - Ryan - on our core team at Mosaic Sheffield, we thought we’d use Thanksgiving as an excuse to host a big party. So yes, many thousands of miles away from the US of A, they’ll be a big party happening on English soil - with primarily English people - celebrating Thanksgiving. We’re excited!
Anyway, we need some help. We want to create as authentic a Thanksgiving celebration as possible. We’re pretty well setup on the food side, but we’d like some suggestions for the music. So…what music do you like to have on during Thanksgiving? What are your favourite Thanksgiving albums and songs?
Thanks for your help!
November 7th, 2006 at 4:58 pm
Hi Sam!
For Thanksgiving I don’t often think about having music. But, if I were to play any it would be some lovely classical music that would create a nice atmosphere but not get in the way of all of the family conversations.
We don’t really have Thanksgiving songs. Mostly the day is about families getting together and sharing a big meal. Sometimes people have the tradition of writing down the things/people that they are thankful for and then sharing those thoughts with each other as they sit around the dinner table together. We have done that a few times and it usually makes everyone cry. It’s pretty touching.
So what is on the menu?
November 7th, 2006 at 6:28 pm
Yep, Tina’s correct. There’s really no such thing as “thanksgiving music.”
I think it’s because Thanksgiving, despite it’s specific food traditions, is a very individualistic experience. It’s about all the blessings that God has poured out into your life this year. Since that varies so widely from person to person I suppose it’s not easy to capture under a common theme song.
The day after Thanksgiving is the official beginning of the Christmas shopping season (largest retail shopping day in America). But even with that so close, most people are content to wait until after Thanksgiving day to begin playing Christmas music.
Food is a whole different subject! Very few American Thanksgiving meals don’t have a turkey sitting at the center. Thanksgiving is often called Turkey-Day. Roasted turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes (or yams), gravy, green bean casserole, pumpkin pie, pecan pie (my personal favorite).
Another tradition is the sleepiness that comes after a big turkey dinner. Some say it’s the tryptophan in turkey that does it, but I’m pretty sure it’s just eating an unusually big meal.
November 7th, 2006 at 11:47 pm
Growing up in a big musical family we always ended up around the piano after Thanksgiving dinner…but no thanksgiving songs really.
I guess you could search through your cd’s or itunes to find songs about being thankful, but no true Thanksgiving songs that I’m aware of.
The big tradition in our family is to look back on the previous year and talk about all we are thankful for.
November 8th, 2006 at 12:16 am
The great thing is to have a cornucopia somewhere about.
As for music, yeah, they’re right; when most Americans think of “music” and “Thanksgiving” they think of Christmas music, because all the stores and radio stations start in with their Christmas music that week-end (I blame Macy’s and their Thanksgiving Day Parade, because their very last float each year is Santa coming to town in his sleigh and from then on he is in every department store!) Sorry, we’re a very materialistic and consumeristic society and Thanksgiving is just sort of mushed into the month-long fete that is the Holiday Season.
You can’t blame us too much, though– have you seen Ohio in November? Flat, stale, and unprofitable. Literally everything is a dreary grey or grey-ish brown: the skies, the roads, the houses with peeling paint, the trees, the grass, the stubbly cornfields, the mice that flee the cold and barren cornfields into the sanctuary of the well-heated houses, the cats who get sleek and self-satisfied catching the mice, the deer and rabbits and wild turkeys, the hunting camo outfits meant to help those with (or without) licenses to thin out the population of deer and rabbits and wild turkeys, and eventually everyone’s faces. It frequently rains; and then not only is the landscape an unrelieved greyish brown, it is also soggy. By the time Thanksgiving rolls around we are so depressed that we have to do something to buck everybody up, and frankly Christmas is the only thing we have to look forward to! Lol. Ohio is beautiful, but not in November!!!
My family, however, did used to sing songs together (my mother would actually play the piano; I know, it’s very “Little Women.” We are hopelessly old-fashioned.) I think we started doing this as a family when we stopped attending Lutheran church, which, as a denomination that has High Church style liturgies, would have had special hymns of Thanksgiving and a special liturgy around Thanksgiving week-end.
Two that I remember well were the hymns We Gather Together and Great Is Thy Faithfulness. Another hymn that makes me, personally think of Thanksgiving Day is For the Beauty of the Earth. Not that the earth is particularly beautiful that time of year, as I’ve stated; maybe it is sung to remind people that yes, Virginia, for several months out of the year there is something to be grateful for.
Have you thought about looking at High Church (Catholic, Lutheran, and, of course, Episcopalian– which is the American version of the CoE) liturgies and hymnals to see what they use that week-end? Or still better, try to dig up the hymns that they would’ve sung in Salem. They were a bit witch-hunting crazy, but I bet they sang a lot.
Yours,
-Mel
November 8th, 2006 at 12:36 am
PS My family’s other Thanksgiving traditions:
-The kids watching the Macy’s parade in the morning
-The men-folk watching (American) football the rest of the day
-Christmas shopping for the women waaay too early the morning after. If you don’t get to the store by 5 or 6 am you will
a) hit too much traffic to get much done;
b) miss the best “door buster” deals;
c) may not be able to find what you want as things are so cheap that the stores run out and you’ll have to wait ’til later when they get another shipment in and pay more; and
d) are a wimp.
Truly, this is a sporting event in it’s own right.
-Christmas movies are always watched either Friday or Saturday, or both. Perennial favorites include The Muppets Christmas Carol, The Miracle on 34th Street, and It’s a Wonderful Life.
-Also that week-end, the Christmas tree goes up and much hot chocolate is drunk!
November 9th, 2006 at 5:11 pm
Thanks for all your replies guys. Much appreciated.
November 9th, 2006 at 5:13 pm
Mel - we’re actually going to be having an “It’s a Wonderful Life” party the week before Christmas.
Christmas trees go up the weekend after Thanksgiving? That seems WAY too early!
November 20th, 2006 at 5:11 pm
Here’s a couple; I know there’s other traditional hymns that always make me feel like Thanksgiving. Enjoy!!!
Now Thank We All Our God : Lutheran Book of Worship 533,
Come, You Thankful People, Come : Lutheran Book of Worship 407