We met Dan Zanes as the singer of The Del Fuegos in the first generation of America's indie underground in the mid-1980s. As he explains in our conversation, he discovered after the band broke up that people were more interested in a cassette he made of family-oriented folk he made with his daughter, her friends and their parents in mind than they were in his solo album. That set his course, and he has been working in the family-friendly field for more than 20 years now. We talk about family-friendly music, folk music, and how his Christmas album, Christmas in Concord, fits in to that musical world. His wife and musical collaborator Claudia is part of the conversation as well, even though she wasn't with him on Christmas in Concord. She is on their new album, the social justice-oriented Let Love Be Your Guide. This episode also inaugurates a change as singer and friend Alexandra Scott joins to talk about Christmas music with Alex, this week focusing on Kelly Clarkson's new "Christmas Isn't Cancelled (Just You)" and her biggest Christmas song to date, "Underneath the Tree." If you haven't already done so, please do what you have to do to get Twelve Songs in your podcast feed. You can find us at Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, Pandora, and Spotify.

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“What did the council decide on item 42?” — answered with the speaker and the moment.

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