Santa Baby

Year: 1953

Written By: Joan Ellen Javits, Philip Springer, Tony Springer, and Fred Ebb

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In 1953, Joan Javits and Philip Springer wrote 'Santa Baby'.  Despite both of these two people being the writers, Tony Springer is also listed as a co-writer, and this is interesting as Tony Springer was just a legal fiction which was created for the purposes of membership in regards to the performing rights organization BMI. Joan Javits happens to be the niece of Senator Jacob K. Javits.

This catchy Christmas song was originally recorded by Eartha Kitt with Henri René, as well as Henri René's orchestra. It was recorded in New York City on October 6, 1953. 'Santa Baby' was to have two catalogue numbers; the first was for when it was released under RCA Victor Records, where its catalogue number was 20-5502 in the USA. The second catalogue number 'Santa Baby' had was by EMI on the His Master's Voice label, this time this Christmas songs catalogue number was B 10728.

'Santa Baby' was a massive hit from the start and in turn meant the song was a huge hit for Eartha Kitt, both for this songs success, but in also prolonging and evolving Eartha Kitt's musical career. It is no wonder that with the substantial success 'Santa Baby' achieved, that Eartha Kitt was to later say that this Christmas song was one of her favourite songs to record. The popularity of this song led to Eartha Kitt reprising 'Santa Baby' in the 1954 film New Faces. 
Due to the success of 'Santa Baby' and the amazing amount of popular demand, Eartha Kitt tried to reprise the original song in a 1963, this re-recording was done with Kapp Records. The subtle change from the 1953 original was that this re-recording featured a more up-tempo arrangement. This 1963 re-recording was the version of which Madonna based her rendition on. Eartha Kitt, again tried to cash in on the huge success of 'Santa Baby' when in 1954, Kitt recorded a new version of the song. This time the new version of the song used new lyrics and was titled differently as 'This Year's Santa Baby'. This time however, Kitt managed to make no commercial success out this version. Though this version of the song was to later feature in the 1989 film Driving Miss Daisy.

The song's lyrical descriptive story telling is from a toungue-in-cheek point of view about Christmas, where a woman is reading her Christmas list and singing about the extravagant gifts the many people want; like yachts and decorations that are to come from Tiffany's.

The amazing amount of popularity that 'Santa Baby' has attracted has led to a huge of covers being made of the song. These covers have come from a variety of artists, putting their own particular spin on this much loved Christmas classic. Notable examples of covers have come from; Madonna, Britney Spears, Macy Gray, Kylie Minogue and the Pussycat Dolls.