THE INSPIRATION  for this project came to me in the mid-1990s from watching Victor Borge's famous classical variants on the 'Happy Birthday' tune.  I wondered what various classical composers would have come up with if they had been commissioned to write 'Jingle Bells' as a classical piece of music.

In each case I started off with an existing work by the composer, transforming it by the end of the piece into the now-familiar holiday melody.  Most works leant themselves to an adaptation more to the refrain ("Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle all the way"), though a couple seemed to be better adaptable to the stanza melody ("Dashing through the snow...").  For two in particular (Beethoven's and Bach's) I was able to come up with a variation on both the stanza and the refrain, though with these composers you may note that the interweaving of the 'classical' and 'Jingle' themes is more subtle and you may have to listen more closely to pick out the carol tune.

After the ten classical variants of the holiday tune below, you will find a link to my own modern improvisation on the 'Jingle Bells' tune.
 

For a sample of JW's other piano improvisation, please click here.

For a combination of piano improvisation with poetry reading, please click here.
.