About Christmas Music Guide
Meet the Reviewer
Casey Kavanagh is a professional musician, singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer, and Christmas music fanatic. A graduate of the University of Minnesota with a degree in music, Casey has spent more than two decades performing, recording, arranging, producing, and studying music across a wide variety of genres.
As a working musician, Casey regularly performs throughout the Midwest as both a solo artist and member of several musical projects. His experience includes piano, saxophone, guitar, vocals, songwriting, and music production. He has released original music, produced recordings for himself and others, and spent thousands of hours analyzing what separates good music from great music.
Since 2017, Casey has published his annual Best New Christmas Albums guide, a yearly deep dive into the latest holiday releases from major-label artists, independent musicians, singer-songwriters, country artists, pop artists, experimental music, and everything in between.
Christmas Music Guide exists for a simple reason:
Nobody else is doing this.
Every year, countless websites publish lists of “best new Christmas music.” Most of them aren’t complete. Most of them aren’t curated. And most of them simply follow the biggest names, the most heavily promoted releases, or whatever happens to be trending on streaming platforms.
Meanwhile, dozens of outstanding Christmas albums fly completely under the radar.
The problem is that finding them takes work.
A lot of work.
For every great holiday album released each year, there are countless forgettable, generic, cookie-cutter recordings that all sound the same. Most listeners don’t have the patience or the desire to sort through hundreds of new Christmas releases looking for the few that are truly special.
Casey does.
Each year, he listens to as many new Christmas albums as he can find, from household names to artists you’ve never heard of. The goal isn’t to identify the most popular releases. It’s to identify the best ones.
Sometimes that means a major-label release earns a spot on the list.
Sometimes it means discovering an independent artist with a fantastic Christmas album that never received radio play, playlist placement, or media attention.
Christmas Music Guide exists to uncover those hidden gems, celebrate exceptional holiday music, and help listeners discover albums they otherwise would have missed.
Because while there is certainly a lot of mediocre Christmas music released every year, there is also a surprising amount of GREAT Christmas music.
You just have to know where to look.
Subscribe below and discover the hidden gems, future classics, and standout releases to help make your Christmas season a little brighter.
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