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Watkins & the Rapiers hits a perhaps world record 100th Christmas song

Watkins & the Rapiers.
Provided
Watkins & the Rapiers.

And the 100th Christmas song written and performed by Watkins & the Rapiers is…

OK, we’ll have to wait for that answer until Tuesday, when the Rochester band presents its annual “Biggest Little Holiday Christmas Show” at The Little Theatre. The band has five brand-new Christmas songs to unveil, although it has already revealed a couple of them during its December Monday-night residency at The Little Café.

But No. 100 has not been among them.

These add to the band’s claim that it has “written and played publicly” more Christmas songs than any band or individual on Earth.

“I’ve done web searches,” says Kerry Regan, one of the band’s co-founders.

And “written and played publicly” is the key phrase. It eliminates from contention the guy playing instrumentals in his bedroom, putting the word “Christmas” in the title and posting it on YouTube.

A few years ago, Watkins & the Rapiers was going to seal the deal as having written and performed the most songs about Christmas by submitting the claim to the Guinness World Records book. But they “opted out because they were going to charge us,” Regan says.

Like The Eagles, except not as well-paid, Watkins & the Rapiers is overloaded with songwriters. Six of the seven band members contribute, and otherwise are a marvel of Swiss Army knife utility.

Tom Whitmore is vocals, guitar, bass, mandolin and melodica. Rick McRae is vocals, keyboards, accordion and trombone. Steve Piper is vocals, electric guitar, ukulele, accordion and bass. Marty York is drums, but lots of ’em. Pete Hasler, who joins the band only for the holiday season, is vocals, trombone, saxophone, flute, keyboards and other assorted in-tune toys. Regan is vocals, guitar, bass and sometimes kazoo. Scott Regan, Kerry’s brother, is vocals and guitar.

(As Scott Regan is an employee of the media company that produced this piece, conflict of interest standards may apply, but he works on the first floor and the author of this piece works on the third floor).

Kerry Regan’s own Christmas songwriting history dates back to the 1970s. One of his earliest efforts was inspired by a skiing accident suffered by President Gerald Ford. Regan was concerned that the fall had ruined the president’s holiday but, “I don’t remember it being a song I carried with me very long,” he admits.

By 1998, Regan and the rest of the band began taking the task seriously and had created enough songs to mount an entire show.

Musicologists – a few, anyway – recognize two types of Christmas songs. Some, such as Scott Regan’s “Santa Claus Parade” and Rick McRae’s audience-participation “Arise Ye North Pole Workers,” with the audience waving candy canes handed out by the band, are show staples year after year.

“My bandmates, many of them favor that approach,” Kerry Regan says; he’s not talking about candy canes, but a song’s timelessness. “I also like a song that could only happen this Christmas.”

Such as songs that age out with politicians.

“A few Trump-era songs are not going to get touched again.”

In addition to the five new songs this holiday season, the band debuted two new songs this summer for a “Christmas in July” show on the beach at Marge’s Lakeside Inn: “No Summer Break for Santa Claus” and “Christmas in July.” The band may not be running out of songs, but it is running out of titles; that’s its second one titled “Christmas in July.”

Tuesday’s shows will be backed by videos, including person-on-the-street interviews done at ROC Holiday Village asking, “who they think of when they think of Christmas music,” Regan says.

“We’ve covered a lot of topics related to Christmas, trying to dig deep,” he says, confessing that’s where the challenge lies.

“How deep can you dig into Christmas?”

The show starts at 7:30 p.m., and tickets are $20. Watkins & the Rapiers also play an hourlong set of their Christmas songs at 8 p.m. Friday at Iron Smoke Distillery in Fairport.

Jeff Spevak has been a Rochester arts reporter for nearly three decades, with seven first-place finishes in the Associated Press New York State Features Writing Awards while working for the Democrat and Chronicle.