Vince Guaraldi Trio – Linus and Lucy

Nothing like Vince Guaraldi for this time of the year. 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.

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.

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

  1. Pingback: Vince Guaraldi Trio – Linus and Lucy – MobsterTiger

  3. I found his CD at Half Price Books: it includes this song and many others written for the show, along with his big radio hits. His music is timeless and still holds up against any of the greats. KVIL, a local easy listening pop and soft rock station back then, played his music. Ron Chapman, the famous DJ, had him on the show once.

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  4. Great music for one of the best holiday traditions, watching ‘A Charlie Brown Christmas’. Those kids sure had the moves! I was given the CD a couple of years ago, I need to dig it out this week

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  5. I forced two of my adult children to watch and listen the other day…..they weren’t interested!….the music for sure fits, partly just hearing it makes us remember, perhaps simpler times….don’t think that song from that Peanut’s movie will have the same effect…..but saying all that, it so fits that special, which I seemed to thing was longer!

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    1. Yeah, different times, simpler times. Nowadays people want to see a turbocharged CGI enhanced magical sleigh with The Rock (or whoever’s mega box office this year) at the reins. But, that’s progress. At least we can enjoy Vince and reminisce about days gone by.

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      2. Yes! I remember that one! That was a great post. Back when I was 18 some of my friends along with girlfriends asked each other what Peanuts character was closer to themselves and we voted….I was voted Schroeder “”Musicians don’t dance””

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  10. Love Pig Pen slapping the cello with his brown sound. Wonder if thats where EVH got the idea from as he always talked about the brown sound…look at Pig Pen.

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