"Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" is as relevant as ever in 2023. That's a bold statement, considering the song was a hit upon its 1958 release, and it got taught to a new generation of Brenda Lee fans through the 1990 film "Home Alone." The song spent two weeks this December at No. 1 before being toppled on the week of Dec. 23 by the usual suspect: Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You."
Lee's on the list of 15 artists in both the country and rock halls of fame, along with Willie Nelson, Dolly Parton, Elvis Presley and a few others. It make sense, then, that country star and rocker-at-heart Carrie Underwood added one of the songs of the season to her setlist for a recent date of her Reflection Las Vegas residency.
Underwood belted out the song while wearing a festive purple dress. As you might expect, her commanding vocals did the Lee classic justice.
Underwood shared a short clip of her performance on social media.
Congratulations [Lee] on the 65th anniversary of ["Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree"," she wrote on Facebook. "It was such a blast to perform your Christmas classic at my [Reflection] show last night!"
"Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" reached No. 1 on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100 chart for the first time on the week of Dec. 4.
In the process, Lee broke several chart records. It's the third pop No. 1 of her career, following two songs from 1960, "I'm Sorry" and "I Want to Be Wanted." The 63-year gap in between Lee's first and most recent No. 1 is the longest in history. Penned by "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" writer Johnny Marks, "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" took the longest climb ever to No. 1. At age 79, Lee surpassed Cher ("Believe," age 52) and Carey ("All I Want for Christmas is You," now age 54) as the oldest woman with a No. 1 song.
