Assembling a holiday album from scratch involves a lot more than having people sing about Santa Claus, Rudolph, eggnog and frigid temperatures and hitting the record button.
Especially when the artists are as varied as Jamie Farr, a jazz orchestra, a swing band, acoustic singer-songwriters, TV news personalities and former “American Idol” stars, and the tracks are recorded in studios around the country.
“The most challenging part would be getting everything to sound good from track to track,” said recording engineer Matt Feher, who had his hand on all 25 tracks of the Make-A-Wish Foundation benefit CD “Holiday Wishes.”

Christopher Stoll, left, and Mighty Wyte

“We had so many different sources of material. Some of it came off CDs, some of it was recorded live, some of the stuff sounded like people were talking in boxes, some of it had room noise in it,” Feher said. “Getting everything homogenized was probably the toughest part.”
Feher, a Toledo Free Press Star writer under the moniker Mighty Wyte, was approached in August by Toledo Free Press Editor in Chief Michael S. Miller about being involved with the holiday album.
Feher has worked as a composer of music used in TV shows, movies and video games for the past 12 years. He works out of his home studio in Point Place.
“I volunteered right off the bat to master the whole thing,” Feher said. “That’s a critical part of any kind of album production, and it’s really one of the things that gets overlooked the most. For an album on this scale, you didn’t want anyone picking up this album at Panera Bread and putting it on in their car and going, ‘What the …? Somebody do this in their basement?’”
Christopher Stoll, co-owner of Zeta Recording in Holland, also played a significant role in making sure there were no “basement” comments from listeners.
Stoll, who has been recording music since 1986 and now teaches music recording at Owens Community College, was in charge of recording, mixing and mastering eight tracks for the album.
Although Stoll has recorded everything from avant-garde bands to classical concerts to Crystal Bowersox’s demo before she headed to Hollywood for “American Idol,” the Make-A-Wish album proved a unique challenge.
“These kind of things are hard because you have all these different styles of music — how do you get them to sound consistent — and it comes down to the mastering,” Stoll said. “All of the songs are just so different, so it is tricky. There’s a million variables. Usually I mix some stuff and I let the band hear it, and we make a decision.”
Feher was impressed with what Stoll was able to do in the studio. Though the two musical engineers have been doing much of the same work in a relatively small market, they had never met.
“Chris Stoll, all the stuff he recorded, he delivered mastered, which was amazing,” Feher said. “He did a fantastic job.”
Both Stoll and Feher said they were honored to be involved with the philanthropic musical effort.
“I was definitely honored to be a part of the whole thing,” Stoll said. “Once you get into these things, you’re never sure what to expect. Everyone I got to work with was totally awesome and people that I’d never worked with. It was pretty exciting.”
Feher concurred.
“I feel exceptionally blessed that [Miller] asked me to do it. It turned out to be so amazing,” Feher said. “The quality is amazing; the work that everyone put in is just stunning. It’s one of the things I’m most proud of in the 12 years I’ve been in this business. I’m excited to see how well it does, and how much we can help Make-A-Wish.”
For Stoll, one of the most endearing parts of the process was seeing the children from Make-A-Wish come to his studio and help Jeff Stewart sing “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.”
“They bring all the kids in, and you see the impact the music has on the kids, you get that lump in your throat,” he said. “It was pretty powerful stuff.”

Jeff Stewart wasn’t sure what to expect when he opened his recording session to the children of the Make-A-Wish Foundation to assist on his Johnny Cash-style version of “Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer.”

Jeff Stewart helps a chorus member with her headphones at Zeta Recording.

“It was overwhelming and very emotional seeing the kids there with their families,” Stewart said. “It meant a lot that they took the time out. It was heartwarming. We had a blast. I didn’t know what to expect. There were a lot of people in the room when I got there. It was kind of nice to keep the kids entertained and let them know they were doing something really cool.”
Stewart said the biggest challenge was encouraging the children to cut loose.
“You have to plug away and try to figure out how to get them to loosen up and sing like there’s nobody else in the room,” he said. “I’ve known the song since I was a kid. Every kid knows it. It’s fun to sing. It’s the stuff that feels good about Christmas.”
The inspiration to use Johnny Cash’s arrangement of “Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer” came to Stewart on the spot.
“I didn’t have a game plan heading to the studio,” he said. “I was thinking of the arrangement as we set the drums up and we figured it out. I wanted to do something with high energy. I thought I could translate my style to the song. It’s the good stuff about Christmas. It always has that innocence to it.”

Chrys Peterson said there was no question which holiday tune she would contribute to “Holiday Wishes.”
Since childhood, the WTOL Channel 11 news anchor has loved Elvis Presley’s “Santa, Bring My Baby Back To Me.”
“I’m not sure if this is my favorite Christmas song of all time, but it certainly ranks right up there,” Peterson said. “When I was a little girl, my mom had three or four Christmas records she would put on the turntable and they would slip down one at a time and play, and one of them was Elvis’ Christmas album. This was my favorite song. I would stand up and try to do the Elvis scowl with my lip. It’s just peppy and kind of uplifting and I’ve just always loved it. It was the first song that came to my mind.”

Chrys Peterson

Peterson enlisted the help of her friend Greg Tye, lead singer of Toledo group Hepcat Revival.
“He just jumped in with no hesitation and worked with me on this,” Peterson said. “They are the most talented musicians — really fun guys and they have hearts of gold. It was a blast working with them. I don’t think they knew the song, but now they all love it too.”
Trumpet player Vince Krolak said the group took the original Elvis tune and “Hep-ified” it.
“The original didn’t have horn parts so we added tenor sax and trumpet sounds and also opened it for instrumental solos between verses to change it up and give it a little more blues flavor. We also changed the key to suit her vocal range,” Krolak said. “With the way Chrys did her vocals you can still hear the Elvis, so it just came together really nicely.”
Peterson said she didn’t feel pressure to live up to The King.
“It’s kind of easy when you’re a woman doing a cover of a man’s song; no one expects you to sound like him. The whole gender thing put a different twist on it,” Peterson said. “Hepcat changed the score just a little bit, but we really wanted to stay true to that rockabilly Elvis style and just put our own talents into it, so that’s what we did.”
Peterson sang in high school choruses and worked her way through college singing with an ’80s rock band, but said she doesn’t sing much beyond the shower now.
“I’m grateful for the opportunity to come out of the shower,” Peterson said, laughing. “There is so much musical talent in the Toledo area; I don’t know what the heck I’m doing on this CD! We are so blessed to have all this talent surrounding us in Toledo and this is the perfect showcase for the talent that is here and the generosity of those people to donate their time and talents to help the kids in Northwest Ohio.”
Toledo Free Press Editor in Chief Michael S. Miller, who compiled the CD, said he thought of Peterson from the project’s inception.
“I have heard Chrys sing at the Red Cross Oscar gala a number of times, and thought it would be a treat for people to hear what a talented vocalist she is,” Miller said.
As a former board member for the Make-A-Wish Foundation, Northwest Ohio Chapter, Peterson has had the chance to see the wish-granting process up close.
“It’s such an amazing organization,” Peterson said. “I get choked up talking about it. I really believe in the power of hope when you’re healing from an illness like that, and I think what Make-A-Wish does for those kids is offer hope. I truly believe that might be the difference that helps some of these kids turn the corner with their illnesses or move through whatever they are dealing with. So to know the money raised from these CDs alone will grant several wishes for kids in Northwest Ohio, that’s really special.”

Toledo Jazz Orchestra director Ron Kischuk enjoyed the vocals guest performer Lori Lefevre-Johnson provided for his band’s performance of “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town.”
“I think she sounded great,” Kischuk said. “She brings her own style to it. It’s not over the top, but she brings a nice, jazzy feel to it. She was doing a concert with us the weekend we recorded and agreed to help out.”

Lori Lefevre-Johnson

Also helping out that weekend was Dwight Adams, Stevie Wonder’s trumpet player and a longtime friend of Kischuk’s.
“Dwight and I have performed together hundreds if not thousands of times,” Kischuk said. “He’s a great guy and a great performer.”
Another musician involved was saxophone player Russ Miller, who also arranged the track.
“It’s an uplifting, happy Christmas song,” Kischuk said. “It’s one of the old standards. When I was growing up, my mother had all the old piano sheet music sitting in the piano bench. You would pull it up and there were ‘White Christmas,’ ‘Silver Bells’ and ‘Santa Claus Is Coming To Town.’ People try to write new carols every year, but the fact of the matter is sometimes the really old tunes are a lot of fun to play and hear.”

Husband-and-wife duo TAPESTRY entered new instrumental territory for its rendition of “Greensleeves,” the opening track of “Holiday Wishes.”
Harpist Denise Grupp-Verbon and guitarist Michael Grupp-Verbon decided while in the studio to include additional instrumentation to their usual sound.

TAPESTRY

Using a synthesizer, the pair added finger cymbals, wind chimes and other string and percussion sounds to the harp and guitar they had already recorded.
“We took a little change from our formula arranging style,” Michael said. “We were originally going to do acoustic harp and guitar; that’s it. Once we got into the studio, bouncing around ideas, we thought we’d go ahead and put together additional arrangements and it just kind of blossomed from there.”
Denise said she is excited about the new direction.
“We were thrilled with it,” Denise said. “We had a lot of fun doing it and it came out sounding better than we hoped. It’s inspired us to start thinking about the possibility of doing an entire Christmas CD of TAPESTRY.”
The duo had already been working on “Greensleeves” when the opportunity to contribute a track to the Make-A-Wish Foundation benefit CD “Holiday Wishes” came up.
“It was actually kind of fortuitous that this was a holiday project because this was something we were working on anyhow, so this just accelerated getting that song put together and ready to go,” Michael said. “It certainly did push us in a direction we were looking to go anyhow, so it definitely was a fun thing to do and we’re very happy with it. This is the perfect place for it to debut.”

Kate Jordan followed in the footsteps of one of her childhood favorites for her take on “The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year.”

Kate Jordan

Jordan said she was excited for the opportunity to cover Amy Grant’s take on the classic.
“It’s definitely one of my favorite Christmas songs,” Jordan said. “That arrangement was one of my favorite arrangements. I love the orchestration.”
“The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year” is the first Christmas song Jordan has ever recorded, and she was happy it was for a project like “Holiday Wishes,” which supports the local Make-A-Wish Foundation.
“It’s an awesome idea,” she said. “I hope a lot of people support it. There’s a lot of diversity on it, and it’s going to an awesome cause.”

Ramona Collins applied her jazz influence to “Holiday Wishes” with the Mel Tormé standard “The Christmas Song.”
“I’ve always liked ‘The Christmas Song’ and I always associate it with Nat King Cole,” Collins said. “It reminds me of being a little girl at Christmas. I thought I’d give it a little different treatment by putting another song in the beginning and then going into that.”

Ramona Collins

Collins opens the song with a verse from the “Peanuts” classic “Christmas Time Is Here” before a piano solo transitions to “The Christmas Song.”
“It reminds me of Charlie Brown,” Collins said. “I was thinking of what I could do different and that song popped into my head. The idea was to surprise people and give it a different flavor.”
The track was recorded and mixed by Dave Mariasy of AudioMatrix Recording Studio in Toledo.
The piano solo was performed by Collins’ longtime collaborator Eric Dickey.
“Eric and I have worked together for about 26 years,” Collins said. “People often think of us in the same breath. Eric is someone I’m comfortable with and he’s comfortable with me. He knows what I like. When I told him I wanted to do that song with a bar or two of ‘Christmas Time Is Here’ he was on board. He knows how I think. He did a beautiful job.”

Jameil Aossey and Charles Lane are a double threat on “Holiday Wishes” with “Mistletoe Love,” an original R&B song on the album.
“They were looking for something urban and more dance or two-step,” Aossey said. “We came up with the mistletoe idea because it kind of related to New Year’s, but it was still holidays without singling out a specific holiday theme. We wanted to go in a different direction than the standard holiday stuff you always hear.”
Aossey and his collaborators wrote and recorded the nontraditional song in just nine days.

Jameil Aossey, Charles Lane and the musicians on ‘Mistletoe Love.’

“It was basically nine days in a row with all-nighters,” Aossey said. “It was a lot of squeeze, but we do that all the time. I have my own studio and people I work with. It was easy to pull everybody together and pull that off.”
Lane is the lead vocalist on the track and Aossey performed spoken word parts. Aossey also played keyboard and did the drum programming. Other musicians performed guitar and saxophone parts.
“I think it’s necessary to have R&B when you’re doing a compilation,” Aossey said. “When you’re throwing that many tracks on there, you should have multiple styles. It gives you something different and unique. Our track could be one you come back to.”
As a father, Aossey said he appreciates what the Make-A-Wish Foundation does and was excited to write a song for the album.
“Once you have kids it increases your sensitivity to the whole thing,” Aossey said. “It makes you appreciate that you have healthy kids, and you want to help out with anything that could ever come along. That’s how I was raised.”

Mannheim Steamroller provides the epilogue to “Holiday Wishes” with the track “Greensleeves,” from its 1988 CD “A Fresh Aire Christmas.”
“It reflects the warmth of the very special holiday season,” group founder Chip Davis said.

Chip Davis

Davis, a native of Sylvania and graduate of Sylvania High School, began playing piano when he was 4 years old and composed his first music two years later.
Davis formed Mannheim Steamroller in 1974 and enjoyed the chance to lead the group on “Greensleeves.”
“As arranged, the Mannheim Steamroller version provides an opportunity for us to reinterpret a classic track,” he said.
The song is one of Davis’ favorite holiday tunes.
“It conveys melodic tones that take the listener to an ethereal space,” Davis said. “It’s always been one of my favorites. I’ve done different arrangements of it on three to four albums.”
Toledo Free Press Editor in Chief Michael S. Miller, who compiled the CD as a fundraiser for the Make-A-Wish Foundation, said having Mannheim Steamroller donate a track was a highlight of the project.
“For many people, Mannheim Steamroller is holiday music,” Miller said. “To have such a nationally known act on the CD raises the profile and reminds listeners that it all started here in Northwest Ohio.”

Pat Dailey’s original song “Here Comes The Cold,” included on the Make-A-Wish Foundation “Holiday Wishes” CD, tells the story of his annual migration from Put-in-Bay to Key West, Fla.
“I sequestered myself on the island after the tourist season was over, and it was pretty empty and pretty lonely,” Dailey said. “I just started thinking about how it’s time to pack up everything and move to Florida for the winter gig. It was conceived by staying on the island too long.”

Pat Dailey

Once Dailey realized how lonely island life is during Ohio winters, he secured his gig in Key West.
“I’ve been working Sloppy Joe’s in Key West for the last 30 years,” Dailey said. “It’s just like going to Put-in-Bay with the same people except one’s in winter and the other in the summer.”
Dailey said the song is particularly relevant now as the weather begins to turn in Ohio.
“There’s a certain mood to it this time of year,” Dailey said. “I’m sitting here on the island by myself. The waves get too big and the ferry boats don’t run. Right now, that song is pertinent.”
Dailey said he was happy to participate in the “Holiday Wishes” project and likes the focus on local talent.
“I think it’s a great idea getting local artists involved in raising funds,” Dailey said. “There’s so much competition. Everybody wants everybody’s money, but Make-A-Wish is pretty special when you stop and think about what they do.”