Ryan Ross Hernandez Presents: All I Want for Christmas Is You

Mariah Carey's 1994 holiday hit "All I Want for Christmas Is You" has quickly established itself as a neo-standard. Now, it's being reworked and reimagined by arguably the most respected and commercially successful solo singer-songwriter in music today, the infinitely charming Ryan Ross Hernandez.

Ryan Ross Hernandez's version of Carey's classic Christmas tune is so markedly different from her upbeat version that it almost sounds like an entirely different tune. Sure, the underlying melody is familiar and easily recognizable, but once Hernandez opens his mouth and laces the song with his signature vocal flair, it's a whole new game. Not to mention a whole new song.

Carey of course has the bigger voice between the two, but it's interesting to see how they attack the same song in totally opposite ways. The song bends according to Hernandez's stylistic changes and never suffers under the weight of the makeover; in fact, it's enhanced. The song's structure truly is flexible.

Hernandez ever-changing role in his music, now tries to establish himself as a modern Rat Packer. You can almost see him singing this song in a jazz bar, on a stool with a suit and fedora on. Whereas Carey's version was jingly and jangly, and almost cheerleader-like, Hernandez's is a slower, much more romantic and dreamy version. He slams on the brakes and pulls back from the bright bells that adorned Carey's original and croons warmly over the melody.

RRH Behind Recording All I Want for Christmas Is You

"All I Want for Christmas Is You, by Mariah Carey. The concept I had for it was completely than what you'll probably expect to hear from it. I did this little acoustic version of it a few years ago when I played at a radio station around Christmas for a small crowd, charity event type thing. Even then it was a bit too cheery for my liking, so when I got into the studio with the band, I knew I wanted it to be slow-paced musically, and give the listener a completely different feeling than Mariah Carey's version. It's slow and heartfelt, taking the lyrics to another place. It took me about a week or two to get the arrangement I wanted before I sang on it.

While having a conversation with my sound engineer and a musician friend of mine, we all agreed that it had to begin with a slow piano intro, and the entire first verse had to just be me singing over it. At one point it was just me. I played the piano and sang and it sounded lovely, but it just didn't capture the feeling I wanted. That's when the strings came into play. That added the intimacy I always had envisioned my version of this song to have. I think we found a good midpoint between big and small, which has intimacy but you could also play in a concert hall. It's different from what I usually do. This one you curl up with some peppermint-spiked hot cocoa and your loved one, and turn this baby up. This song is for the ladies. I'm not gonna fuck around with you and say otherwise. This song is for the ladies to enjoy."

In-Depth Analysis

[Intro: 0:00 - 0:07]

The song begins with a repeated piano note being hit over and over. After a bare 3 seconds, a more composed piano melody is played.

[Verse 1: 0:08 - 0:36]

Over the piano playing, Hernandez's undoubted vocals begin to serenade the listener through the recorder. Don't expect any falsetto singing here though. The singer is wearing his lower-register, baritone voice into play. He sings the first verse with ease. Seemingly to keep it into the more intimate, almost live feeling of the song, you can hear Ryan taking quick breathes in the minimal pauses between certain stanzas. Throughout the verse, the piano melody remains intact from the intro. The only note Ryan sustains for a few seconds is the final word of the verse.

I don't want a lot for Christmas
There is just one thing I need
I don't care about those presents
Underneath the Christmas tree
I just want you for my own
More than you could ever know
Make my wish come true
You know that all I want for Christmas
Is you...

[Verse 2: 0:37 - 1:22]

Again the piano gets the limelight for a few seconds, just before a deep bassline is heard, quickly making way for a calm bass drum kick and gentle cymbal tapping. Along with them comes the string section. It literally just takes five seconds for the new instruments to be introduced before Ryan opens his mouth again to sing at the same pace as he was before. The sound gets larger in this verse with the addition of more instruments. The instruments remain steady, balancing each other, and never actually getting too loud or falling behind. The piano become almost inaudible with the rise of the other instruments in this verse. As Hernandez progress through the song, there are a few ending notes that he sings in a louder tone, again never falling back in this often used falsetto.

I won't ask for much this Christmas
I won't even wish for snow
No, I'm just gonna keep on waiting
Underneath the mistletoe
There's no sense in hanging stockings
There upon the fireplace
Cause Santa he won't make me happy
With a toy on Christmas Day
I just want you here tonight
Holding on to me so tight
Girl, what can I do?
You know that all I want for Christmas
Is you...

[Verse 3: 1:23 - 1:56]

The other instruments disappear and the piano becomes prominent, just for a mere moment as the other instruments don't take very long to return and sound that much bigger than before. The drummer can finally come out of his shell and play his entire drum set with more of a punch to it. The strings continue doing their thing in the background, and some jingle bells even come out in this one, going at the same pace as the drums do. Ryan sings this verse a bit louder than the previous ones, seemingly building up to the final two stanzas when he sings in the most earnest voice heard throughout the entire song.

And all the lights are shining
So brightly everywhere
And the sound of children's
Laughter fills the air
And everyone is singing
I can hear those sleigh bells ringing
Santa won't you bring me the one I really love
Won't you please bring my baby to me...

[Bridge: 1:57 - 2:26]

To reprise the first verse, Ryan sings the bridge just over the introductory piano melody in a soft, calm voice. Of course, following the brief intro, comes the raising point of the song. All the instruments colliding together to create this big band sound. The drums, jingle bells, and string section dominating the music-scape. When the sea sounds comes, Hernandez sings in his loudest range yet, never sounding whiny, but rather giving it the boost the song needed at its highest point.

I don't want a lot for Christmas
This is all I'm asking for
No, I just wanna see my baby
Standing right outside my door
Oh I just want you for my own
More that you could ever know
Make my wish come true
You know that all I want

[Outro: 2:27 - 2:52]

The piano again makes its way here in the outro, sounding just as it did during the intro. Ryan sings in his baritone voice, bringing it back from the loudest we heard from him throughout to the most quiet, keeping his voice in a near whisper to end the song on a quiet note from the emotional turmoil that is the song.

For Christmas
Is you...
Is you...

A Break in the Clouds. It's a new song I've written, and it's also the title of my fifth studio album. Go crazy message boards.

- Ryan

"Where I'm bound, I can't tell
Goodbye's too good a word, baby
So I'll just say farewell
I ain't sayin' you treated me unkind
You could have done better but I don't mind
You just kinda wasted my precious time
Don't think twice, it's all right"

- "Don't Think Twice It's All Right" by, Bob Dylan

When I listen to my favorite records, I wonder how the atmosphere was in the room when they were making it.

I want to tell you a little about where I'm going. I think it's important to let my fans know where I'm going. I've done the pop thing, as much as I can do the pop thing. And I will be retiring for a couple of years from the pop thing. Mainly because I feel I have some other shapes and colors that I have to get to. I know this is a weird thing for you all because I haven't made a straightforward pop album since my debut record. But with every record from there, I've always had pop elements in my music.

If you look at my history as a professional recording artist and as a unprofessional celebrity, you would know that I really haven't played the media game very much in recent memory. That's not to say that I've dropped from the face of the earth, because I haven't. But I was thinking about this earlier, I haven't done an interview in over sixteen months. My last interview was in September 2010. I never meant to have that much me happen. Some would say that having your name heard for a good thing or bad, is a good problem to have.

I found this antidote to bullshit about two years ago, it's called Bob Dylan. I don't know if you've ever heard that. You put those records right to your chest, and poof, makes GirlSpice go right away. And I will back that up with anyone in front of me, if I have to. It's a proven fact. If you get too much GirlSpice or Isabel, and you get some Bob Dylan in your life, it offsets it. You get drunk as fuck in a club listening to Buzz & Hype, then you put Bob Dylan on at two in the afternoon the following day, it's like sticking a syringe in your neck. So if you ever need some antidote to bullshit, get some Bob Dylan in your life. It works.

I think the way that I learned how to write songs, was by playing so many of other people's songs, then setting myself on my way to use that same sort of harmonic, rhythmic, or melodic approach. If you want to listen to the gateway of the next sound I want to make, listen to Bob Dylan's "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right".

The musical foundation for my new record can be described as organic 60s and 70s guitar sounds. For the last few months I've wondered, "What would it sound like if I wrote an album of old-school sounding songs on a cowboy guitar under the stars?" With every new record I start, a new aesthetic comes in, I can't help it.

Matters of the Heart was an acoustic rock/pop album. Dark Secret Love was a blues/pop album with a lot of soul to it. Let a Man Be Lost, which still stands as my best album, was a blues-rock album which still showed my sensibilities in everything I had done before that point. Running Changes was a rock album. A Break in the Clouds will be my folk album. An album that not many people may enjoy because it won't sound like the idea others have of me, but it's the next step in my artistic cycle.

What will be playing on my vinyl record while I make this record, is all old-school singer-songwriters; Bob Dylan, Neil Young, John Wesley Harding, Crosby, Stills & Nash, George Harrison, Tom Petty, Joni Mitchell. I want to write in the texture that all those songwriters wrote or still write in. Sonically, I want to sound more intimate and natural, but a modern version of that America 60s and 70s music. I'm learning the characteristics that those songwriters had, and bringing them to myself, a 21st century songwriter.

Music is timeless. Yet, I've learned that as a singer/songwriter, songs are meant to pass through you. They aren't meant to last a lifetime. I think the minute a songwriter realizes that, it's when they can say they've entered their artistic ether.

It may not mean nothing to you all at this point, I won't say you have a reason to care anyways. But once the album is out, I think opinions will be formed and people will be divided. And that's okay.

Now it's time to disappear in the studio until it gets warm. Can you get the hint?

- Ryan