Vince Guaraldi Trio – Linus and Lucy

It’s hard to resist this song. It automatically makes me happy when I hear it. I see the Peanuts gang doing their thing.

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This song I can hear anytime of the year and be happy. It’s associated with Christmas also…whichever… I never get tired of it.

I was reminded of this song this year in Hanspostcard’s song draft when run-sew-read’s pick was this song.

Ironically, just about everyone would call this “the Charlie Brown song” even though it’s actually titled after Linus and Lucy Van Pelt, brother and sister in Charles Schulz’s Peanuts comic strip universe.

The song is most famous for its use in the yearly favorite A Charlie Brown Christmas, which first aired in 1965, but it was written two years earlier for a documentary about Schulz and the Peanuts gang called A Boy Named Charlie Brown, which never aired.

Producer Lee Mendelson was in charge of the documentary and asked Vince Guaraldi to compose music for it

Guaraldi was huge in the jazz world and won the 1962 Grammy for Best Original Jazz Composition for “Cast Your Fate To The Wind” for his group, the Vince Guaraldi Trio. Mendelson was searching for what kind of music to play for the documentary when he took a taxi cab and “Cast Your Fate To The Wind” was playing as he crossed the Golden Gate bridge. He loved it and his decision was made.

Guaraldi wrote a series of songs for the project, including “Linus and Lucy,” that he recorded with his group, the Vince Guaraldi Trio. Even though A Boy Named Charlie Brown was shelved, the soundtrack was released in 1964, which is where “Linus and Lucy” first appeared.

In 1965, Mendelson put together the first Peanuts TV special, A Charlie Brown Christmas, using many of the same people who worked on the documentary. “Linus and Lucy” formed the score, and a song he wrote with Guaraldi called “Christmas Time Is Here” was included in a key scene.

When A Charlie Brown Christmas debuted in 1965, it quickly turned the Peanuts franchise into a television institution. That first special also shot Guaraldi to greater fame, and he became connected to all subsequent Peanuts shows.

Guaraldi would continue to work on Peanuts films until his death in 1976.

No words…just enjoy

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, Alternative music, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player. Not the slightest bit interested in politics at all.

26 thoughts on “Vince Guaraldi Trio – Linus and Lucy”

  3. I went looking for that classic Christmas show on YouTube last night & I couldn’t find it. I miss being able to see it on CBS way too early or whatever network. I probably missed it cause they showed in October or something…lol.

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  5. a true classic and part of the brilliance of it was Vince’s great jazz that was so uncharacteristic for cartoons. It’s amazing – beyond that really – that several pieces of this are now Christmas classics… instrumental jazz bits from a cartoon. But they mean ‘Christmas’ to many of us. Man those kids had the best moves on the floor!

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  9. I was so surprised when I was young that you could buy Peanuts music on a record to listen to. I guess I thought it was just for the shows. There’s nothing else like it. An all-time classic. All I can say.

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