The song starts with an enchanting bell toll, taking me to the middle of a snow white winter, where the chime of sleigh bells makes me swell with holiday spirit.

Music is one of the defining aspects of the holiday season. However, Christmas music’s lack of diversity in genre, artists and innovation hurts its potential.

If Christmas were to be described by one sound, it would be the iconic jingling of Christmas bells. So, nearly every Christmas song, from “White Christmas” to “Santa Baby,” incorporates the melodic bells somewhere in their instrumental. 

However, by overusing certain sounds and following unchanging musical patterns, almost all holiday music sounds the same. It is hard to tell the difference between “All I Want for Christmas Is You” and “Santa Tell Me” when both use the same jingling bells, hoof thuds and twinkles.

Christmas music can be fixed if artists keep up with the times. “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” with an electric guitar as backing or “Sleigh Ride” on a synthesizer would bring some much needed modernization to a genre largely composed of outdated songs. 

While popularizing different genres of music is important, issues surrounding the diversity of Christmas music cannot be solved by individually convincing people to listen.  Blame also lies in the institutions that make certain types of Christmas music popular. Radio stations, record labels and media organizations all tend to favor traditional Christmas music, shying away from new, unique music and causing older Christmas music to become overplayed. 

For example, “Last Christmas” by Wham!, which was released in 1984, remains overplayed. Despite its age, it is still the second most played Christmas song on the radio in the 2020s, according to the University of Oxford. 

In a similar vein to “Last Christmas,” “All I Want for Christmas Is You” is the poster child of a Christmas pop song. I have grown tired of hearing this song in every department store, radio station and Hallmark movie. For the past five years, Carey’s holiday jingle has shot to the top of the Billboard Charts every Christmas according to Billboard’s official chart history. 

Thanks to the habit of radio and media corporations to appeal to nostalgia, most people have been exposed to the same few Christmas songs their entire lives, making listening to holiday music boring.

To change Christmas music, people need to change the organizations that control it. Radio stations must start playing holiday music from different genres, and record labels must promote artists making experimental Christmas tunes more extensively. 

Christmas music has been a staple of the holidays for years. However, the lack of variance in the genre has slowly begun sapping away from the seasonal spirit many people look for in holiday tunes. Change must come in the instrumentals, genres and institutions of Christmas music.  All I want for Christmas are some new holiday tunes.