Stu Phillips & The Hollyridge Strings Interview
November 28th, 2008
We’re going to begin the 5th Christmas season at FaLaLaLaLa.com with something we haven’t done before. Here we have the first FaLaLaLaLa Exclusive Interview.
With the release of Christmas Favorites by The Hollyridge Strings on Collectors’ Choice Music, I thought it would be great to get to talk to the man behind the music–composer, conductor and arranger, Stu Phillips.
Mr. Phillips was gracious enough to accept my invitation and we spent almost an hour on the phone talking about many aspects of the music. I’ve edited it down to the important parts (it still clocks it at a little over 30 minutes).
Take a listen.
If you’d like to learn more about the history of Stu and the Hollyridge Strings, head on over to Stu’s site and purchase his autobiography, Stu Who?
And be sure to purchase a copy of this classic album for yourself. Heck, why not get one for every member of the family…?
[amazon-product]B001G5IJXS[/amazon-product]
Fantastic interview King! I’m so glad that Stu Phillips remains relatively positive about his time in the music business. I totally pictured him as a jaded curmudgeon, especially after reading his quotes from the CCMusic Hollyridge Strings reissue liner notes.
Bravo, King! I hope “Christmas Favorites” sells millions – for Stu Phillips’ sake and so Capitol realizes the gold mine they’ve been missing all these years. I mean, I’m sure they’re getting a cut of the royalties from CCM’s sales, but still. Shame on them for letting this great music languish in the vaults!
And BTW, for anyone who owns a copy of Steven Spielberg’s “Catch Me If You Can,” (a GREAT period movie practically overflowing with 1960s-era icons that features an even better TRUE LIFE cat & mouse tale of suspense!) I scanned my copy to hear “I’ll Be Home For Christmas” as mentioned by Stu Phillips. Just so you know, the scene doesn’t play out quite like he said it does. The scene he described is close to the end of the movie and the song playing in the background is Nat King Cole’s “The Christmas Song.” The Hollyridge Strings actually appear much earlier in the film, during chapter 15, at approximately the 1 hour 36 minute mark. The scene features Leonardo DiCaprio’s character sitting in a bar talking to Tom Hanks’ character on the phone. It’s very faint, but you can definitely hear “I’ll Be Home For Christmas” in the background. How cool is that?
WAY…TOO…COOL King !!!