1998Released
4:17

Did You Know?

Interesting facts and trivia about Christmas Canon. By Songfacts®.

The base of "Christmas Canon" is Johann Pachelbel's Canon in D major, which has been sneaking its way into Pop music for years. The Bee Gees borrowed the harmony for their debut hit "Spicks And Specks" in 1966 and, according to music producer Pete Waterman, Kylie Minogue's 1988 single "I Should Be So Lucky" was also based on Canon in D. Trans-Siberian Orchestra added new lyrics and melodies to the piece for "Christmas Canon" with strings and piano accompaniment for a traditional sound. Later, they added their signature rock edge for "Christmas Canon Rock" on 2004's The Lost Christmas Eve.

The marriage of Classical music and Rock is what Trans-Siberian Orchestra is all about, but it's not always easy under the rapid-fire pacing of their perfectionist producer/lyricist Paul O'Neill. TSO's Jon Oliva told us: "He'll say, 'Here's Brahms' Piano Concerto in A minor, write something to go along with it.' I've never even heard that - what are you talking about? Brahms' 48 Concerto Symphony to the 10th power, all right. You'd better give me a day on this, Paul." "I can't read music," Oliva added. "So I have to listen to this stuff. You get the track, they burn the track and the thing's 37 minutes long. I'm like, 'Where do you want me to write what? It's already a half hour long!' 'No, I want you to do something between this riff and this riff and make it hard rock.' I'm like, 'You'd better give me a day on this.'"

Top Listeners

Song Analysis

Key, BPM (tempo) and time signature of Christmas Canon.
DKey
MajorMode
4/4Time Signature
133BPM

Album

The album Christmas Canon is released on.

Released By

The record label that has released Christmas Canon.
Lava
© 1998 Atlantic Recording Corporation for the United States and WEA International Inc. for the world outside of the United States.
℗ 1998 Atlantic Recording Corporation for the United States and WEA International Inc. for the world outside of the United States

See your Spotify stats (with number of plays and minutes listened) and discover new music.

Music data, artist images, album covers, and song previews are provided by Spotify. Spotify is a trademark of Spotify AB.

5.8MArtists
73.6MSongs
12.3MAlbums
6.3KGenres
2.5MLabels
493KPlaylists