Darlene Love Reflects On Her Enduring Holiday Classic

How Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) 1963 Release Became a Modern Christmas Staple

Darlene Love will never stop thinking of her holiday classic, “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home).” At this time of year, she couldn’t if she tried. “The post office, grocery store, elevator,” she says with a laugh, listing just a few places where she hears the song constantly. “It just feels funny that my song is in that many places at Christmastime.”

Her signature record, released in 1963, now sits comfortably alongside holiday standards like Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas” and Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You.”

For years, Love performed “Christmas” annually on David Letterman’s late-night show until the series ended in 2015. She’s continued the tradition on programs such as “The View” and “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon,” where she’s set to return on Dec. 18 with Steve Van Zandt, Paul Shaffer and others.

During an interview at Sony Music’s offices near Madison Square Park, the 84-year-old singer’s spirit feels as youthful as her voice once sounded. Generations of musicians have revered Love, who entered the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2011 and appeared in the Oscar-winning documentary “Twenty Feet from Stardom.”

Born Darlene Wright in Los Angeles, the daughter of a minister, she grew up performing and was signed by producer Phil Spector in 1962. He renamed her “Darlene Love” and used her powerful mezzo-soprano to anchor his lush “little symphonies for the kids.” When he decided to create a Christmas album, he recruited her for standards like “White Christmas” and the new original that became her signature.

Written by Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich with Spector, the song pushed her into unfamiliar territory. She still remembers the intense recording session, complete with Christmas lights and a tree as Spector tried to make a summer studio feel like winter.

Their relationship was complicated long before Spector’s later conviction for murder. Early on, he recorded Love singing “He’s Sure the Boy I Love” but released it under another group’s name without telling her. She later sued him for unpaid royalties and won $250,000 in the 1990s. Still, she recalls teasing him about his hairpiece and platform shoes, and remembers stepping into a protective role for two teenagers in the studio: Ronnie Bennett, later Ronnie Spector, and Cher.

As Cher wrote in her memoir, Love was unafraid to challenge the men in the room. On breaks, Love insisted the girls join her across the street for hamburgers despite their boyfriends’ objections. “Come on, let’s go do this,” she told them, laughing now that she was “always getting everybody in trouble.”

Love and Cher would collaborate repeatedly over the years. Cher sang backup on “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home),” and Love later supported her on tour. When Cher recorded a Christmas album recently, she called Love hoping she would join her on the song. Love admits she didn’t recognize the voice at first. “She said, ‘Hey, doll.’ She said, ‘This is Cher.’ And I said, ‘Who?’ She said, ‘Cher, bitch!’”

The original album, “A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector,” is now considered a landmark of the era. But its release date, Nov. 22, 1963, coincided with the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, overshadowing it completely. It took years for the record to catch on, and Love’s song didn’t become a perennial classic until her regular appearances on Letterman began in the 1990s.

Love believes the song lasts because anyone can see themselves in it, whether longing for a lover, a missing sibling, or someone who passed away. Asked whether there’s another holiday song she would want to sing every year, she immediately chooses “Silent Night,” a song she says is both comforting and melancholy. It reminds her of seeing countless stars in the darkness of the mountains. “When you say ‘Silent night, holy night,’ you’re talking about stars,” she says.