Kristin Chenoweth - "Come On, Ring Those Bells"

As every Holiday Season, this month I’ll be choosing only Holiday Songs from as many holidays as I can.

It’s a bit hokey, but it’s also really fun. In a year when things are rife with fear, and anger, and sadness, sometimes you have to choose to be happy, and that is exactly what this song does. I may not 100% subscribe to the ideology, but the sheer spunk of the song is enough to make it memorable.

Kristin Dawn Chenoweth  is an American actress and singer, with credits in musical theatre, film and television. In 1999, she won a Tony Award for her performance as Sally Brown in You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown on Broadway. In 2003, Chenoweth received wide notice for originating the role of Glinda in the musical Wicked, including a nomination for another Tony. Her television roles have included Annabeth Schott in NBC's The West Wing and Olive Snook on the ABC comedy-drama Pushing Daisies, for which she won a 2009 Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series. She also starred in the ABC TV series GCB in 2012.

Chenoweth sang gospel music as a child in Oklahoma and studied opera before deciding to pursue a career in musical theatre. In 1997, she made her Broadway debut in Steel Pier, winning a Theatre World Award, before appearing in You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown and Wicked. Her other Broadway roles were in The Apple Tree in 2006, Promises, Promises in 2010 and On the Twentieth Century in 2015, for which she received another Tony Award nomination. She has also appeared in five City Center Encores!, Off-Broadway and regional theatre productions.

Chenoweth had her own sitcom, Kristin, in 2001, and has guest-starred on many shows, including Sesame Street and Glee, for which she was nominated for Emmy Awards in 2010 and 2011. In films, she has played mostly character roles, such as in Bewitched (2005), The Pink Panther (2006) and RV (2006). She has played roles in made-for-TV movies, such as Descendants (2015); done voice work in animated films such as Rio 2 (2014) and The Peanuts Movie (2015) along with the animated TV series Sit Down, Shut Up; hosted several award shows; and released several albums of songs, including A Lovely Way to Spend Christmas (2008), Some Lessons Learned (2011), Coming Home (2014), The Art of Elegance (2016) and For the Girls (2019). Chenoweth also penned a 2009 memoir, A Little Bit Wicked.

So today, choosing joy, I chose Kristen Chenoweth’s version of “Come On, Ring Those Bells” as my, look for the joy, find your light, stand strong, song for a, even in the darkness, a little more love, like a bellwether in a storm, Wednesday.