On Holly (Sirius channel 81 and XM channel 35) you can hear contemporary holiday hits mixed with selected traditional favorites. Holly will air through New Year's Eve, December 31.
Then there's Bing Crosby Christmas Radio (Sirius channel 113 and XM channel 120) which will air a non-stop broadcast of more than twenty years of vintage Bing Crosby holiday radio specials. The channel which will be hosted by the Crosby family, will air starting December 13th at 12-midnight ET to Christmas Day, December 25t.
Holiday Traditions (XM channel 36) will broadcast traditional holiday recordings from the '40s through the '60s. Holiday Traditions will air beginning Monday, November 24th at 12-midnight ET through Christmas Day, December 25th.
For holiday music by great classical musicians, check out Holiday Pops (Sirius channel 79 and XM channels 37 and 77). You'll hear the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Luciano Pavarotti, Boston Pops and Leontyne Price among others. Holiday Pops will air beginning Thanksgiving Day November 27th at 12-midnight ET to Christmas Day, December 25th.
Radio Hanukkah (Sirius channel 3 and XM channel 38) will broadcast a celebration showcasing Hanukkah music and Jewish culture. Radio Hanukkah will air starting the first night of Hanukkah on December 21th starting at 12-midnight ET to December 29th.
Bah Humbug! No SpecialXmas! My holiday will be entirely incomplete! Can't they find room for the best channel XM ever created?
Yeah, I miss SpecialXmas too. But, Slacker has a station called Dysfunctional Holiday that is pretty good.
Here is a link to it I found in their forums.
http://www.slacker.com/?sid=prog:874
Too bad I won't be enjoying the Xmas lineup since I will be canceling my two XM subs on Sunday.
I'm very very happy with my newly purchased Slacker.
That's great. Why waste your time posting it on here then.
This is pathetic. Why can't they just use the same channel numbers? You can change them all, but USE THE SAME DAMN NUMBER. This is stupid. If this company can't even get its numbering together, I'm about ready to give up as an investor. There is NOTHING that indicates it's being run efficiently.
Just killing channels isn't the answer. Give users a reason to like you! Damn.
I only have one question. Why, in their infinite wisdom, has XM assigned two channels for Hokiday Pops (37 & 77)? That seems rather strange considering that none of the other holiday offerings have two channel positions.
I wonder if they will get the wi-fi update done for the Stiletto 100 in time for Christmas so I can actually hear Channel 81 at home. I guess I can listen to 81 in my car on my Startmate.
The situation with the Stiletto update is pretty annoying. The Stiletto 100 was only introduced two years ago. Early buyers (of which I was too cheap to be one) paid upwards of $350. Updates to it are now treated as an after thought. The situation for the S50s is even worse.
I'm glad to hear that Radio Hanukkah will be back. I'm not Jewish, but that's a fun channel.
Oh and of course it wouldn't be Sirius without a dedicated artist channel. I'm sure the Crosby family is being compensated quite nicely for letting Sirius use their voices.
I see XM is not deviating from it's idiotic tradition of depriving us of an entire month of XM Pops. Why not have holiday music on channel 37 and keep regular programing on channel 77?
Slacker promoters - why do you continue to visit this blog if you have canceled your satellite radio subscriptions. Move on, please, and spew your negative energy elsewhere.
No Sirius XM holiday party, no Special XMas.
Scrooge is feeling right at home on satellite radio!
HO HO HO !!! Come merger, come Feb Dept, come Cancellations, come.... and get Screwed !!! Santazin is here, boys and girls. Come over here and sit on Santszins lap !!! You've been good boys and girls this year, so I'm going to be extra nice to you. Those bad boys and girls, the ones that listen to terrestrial radio and buy I-pods, Santazin has nothing for them; they don't believe in the "FUTURE OF RADIO". Bad, bad bratty kids.
OK, little boy and girl, don't pull on Santazins beard - it's fake, like most of my promises to subscribers and shareholders. Thats better. Now boys and girls, I hope you understand that Santazin can't always get you what you want. I got your list that you sent me, and I know that you kids wanted a Play Station. Well kids, theres been a lot of churn with pissed off elves, so I had to get you something else. Here it is, little boy and little girl, Santazin wants you to have this CHANGE STATION !!! It isn't what you are accustomed to, and it isn't what I promised, but.... you little shits are going to accept it and you are going to like it !!! Now don't cry kids. Santazin just wants to make every little boy and girl happy !!! Now listen to me, kids. When you get the CHANGE STATION home, don't cry if it doesn't work. It won't work unless you tell mommy and daddy to send dear old Santazin an extra $4.00 a month. Remember kids, you can't play with the CHANGE STATION unless your nice parents send me the money. If they don't send me the money, you can re-gift the Goddamn thing and give it to mom and dad. Tell them it's a high tech paper weight or something. HO HO HO !!! Come on boys and girls... don't look so sad. You almost got what you wanted. The economy sucks, and dear old Santazin has to cut some corners here and there. I promise - you wont miss that better thing that you loved for years. You just have to get used to loving something much worse.
Well, before I go, lets have a little contest, boys and girls! See that sign across the street, the one that says "SUBSCRIPTIONS" on it? Let's see who can hit that target first. Now boys and girls, if Santazin hits the target first, be big and brave and don't cry. Santazin has had bad luck hitting that target this year, but I've always been known for my ability to throw a good snowjob... ER...UM... I mean snowball. I meant snowball.
MERRY Xm-MAS
Thank you for the 75 x 2 for cancelling the subs!
I will be buying three subs!
Maybe sirius will buy slacker and pandora!
Ha, comments like this one are exactly the reason I read this site. Pure comedy!
No Sirius XM holiday party, no Special XMas.
Scrooge is feeling right at home on satellite radio!
hey RMAN,
Hasn't sirius screwed enough subscribers. Slacker and Pandora is off limits. Trust me.
I have a slacker and there is an awful lot of junk on it. The classical msic selections are all by fourth rate orchestras and they play very little major sixties groups.
Agreed. Why keep bitchin'? Shouldn't you be moaning on the slacker site about how awful their music is? I know because I have a slacker and thre is a lot of junk on their channels.
And just how much holiday music is on slacker? None so far.
Why, in their infinite wisdom, has XM assigned two channels for Hokiday Pops (37 & 77)
Because it will really live on XM 77 and take over that channel...but in order to be cool and more awesome, they also map it to channel 37 to be in the "holiday" neighborhood. Sirius likes to scatter things around.
Interestingly, the Stiletto 100, on the Wi-FI side, is playing Channel 81 on the non-numbered "Super Shuttle".
Channel 4 has been playing on channel 76 but still no "90's on 9"
Yesterdaym I received the following in an email from Mary Sue Twohy of XM15 The Village.
"Please note XM15 will be a Holiday Traditions from Nov 24- Dec 25 with your favorite holiday tunes. The Village, your folk haven, will return with bells on Dec 26. We are taking these weeks to work on our music library – dusting and mopping – while you do your holiday shopping. Have a wonderful holiday on behalf of all of us at XM15 and no worries – The Village will return on December 26."
I did not see this mentioned in the announcement posted on Orbitcast.
Bob
Correction - slacker does have Holiday music now. My mistake.
No Special-X...
...I hate the merger.
I'm another one looking at a blue Christmas without Special Xmas
Really.?.? Special Xmas is that popular?
I mean how many times can they possibly play the crazy wacky zany "Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer?"
Or how many Bob Rivers songs can they play in a day?
Just tune in to Holly and be happy they even do stuff like this for the holidays.
I'm just tired of hearing nothing but whining & moaning. People even are complaining about how the channel numbers don't match, I mean c'mon. If you can't understand the reason why they don't match, then I'm not going to explain it.
(Even though I think they should have made all the channels match-up, there's a very easy reason to understand why they don't).
Yea, I’m bummed out that they’re gonna bump The Village for holiday programming. Why couldn’t they use one of the many rock or pop channels rather than such a unique channel. I guess they will suggest Village fans listen to The Loft or Coffeehouse instead, but these are not the same.
To the post about Slacker and Holiday music -
There si quite a bit on there. I am really enjoying the device in my car. Just hooked it up to the home theatre and it sounds great.
I doubt that Slacker is causing the current problems for SIRI, but Slacker is doing a hell of a job. I just cannot figure out how they make money.
December 21th?
Who cares about holiday music, MEL! Really who cares! You sir, have run this company to the ground with your incompetence!
Special Xmas was the best of the XM Christmas channels. I'm very disappointed.
Why are they not putting Holiday Traditions on Sirius as well as XM. This has always been XM's best Xmas channel and it's the only one that's not being simulcast on both services. That sucks.
Yeah sure, Special Xmas was just a crappy collection of zany novelty tunes, right? Hey Ass Munch, did you ever listen? Did you? If so, you'd know that they NEVER played Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer. Special Xmas was actually a well thought, intelligent alternative to the mega-mall flood of mediocre Christmas shit.
Like the stuff heard on Holly.
Enjoy Jim Brickman and Mariah Carey, now that's some good stuff!
The reason for December 21 for Radio Hannukah is that this is the first day of Hannukah.
Re: Special XMas:
"I mean how many times can they possibly play the crazy wacky zany 'Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer?'"
None. That was Lou Brutus' number-one rule in programming the channel: you will not hear Elmo & Patsy's version of the song. You may hear odd cover versions (John "Bowtie" Barstow, ska-punkers Less Than Jake), you may hear anti-"Grandma" songs (Dr. Elmo, American Comedy Radio), but you won't hear the stale original (just the stale imitations).
"Or how many Bob Rivers songs can they play in a day?"
He has five holiday discs, plus a few tracks on another holidays-throughout-the-year album. I'm putting my money on "a whole bunch".
But it wasn't just Bob Rivers that Brutus played. It was Brian Setzer. It was Stan Freberg. It was Dean Martin. It was the Therapy Sisters. It was Joel Kopischke. It was Regis Philbin. It was South Park. It was El Vez. It was Lounge Magic. It was Lounge Against The Machine. It was Martin Mull. It was Mae West. It was all the great long-hidden stuff that people like John Waters and Eddie Gorodetsky dug up for their compilations. It was all the amazing new stuff commissioned by folks like Kevin & Bean for their compilations. It was the truly inventive stuff that the folks at Verve and Capitol allowed the electronica crowd to take, remix, and turn completely inside out.
It was everything that everyone else says Christmas music should never be -- and everything its many fans were very grateful it was.
And now, it's gone. And there's nothing even remotely like it out there, save for internet streams (and, really, how many people even have streaming capacity up and running in their cars?).
Not to pick, but Lou Brutus hadn't been involved in Special Xmas since the demise of Special X as a complete channel several years ago. Somebody else from XM programmed the channel since then (although they kept the no Grandma Got Run Over agreement in place).
Special Xmas has really grown over the past years since the full time channel went away and turned into something you just couldn't find anywhere else. It really was more than just a bunch of stupid novelty songs. The cheesy holiday production on the channel made it almost bearable.
I got dragged to the mall last night and never needed Special Xmas as bad as I did coming out of there. Holy St. Nicholas crap!
I only kept my subscription to xm because of SpecXmas. Our family really enjoyed the unpredictability of the music on that station, how could you have 100 sports channels and only 2 for xmas? some idiot in a corporate boardroom obviously is out of touch,