How does a white guy from Detroit end up playing Latin music? Pianist Arthur Hanlon, one of the stars of the HBOMax concert film Piano Y Mujer, talks about that and his relationship to Motown in this week's conversation. We talk about the EP he released before Christmas, A Holiday Christmas Piano, and the roles Facebook and COVID played in making it happen. Along the way, we also talk about earlier Christmas releases and how Christmas music fits into Hanlon's big picture. This week, we also look at one of the bigger songs of the 2021 holiday season, "Merry Christmas" by Ed Sheeran and Elton John, and the song that beat them to become number one on the British pop charts at Christmas. During our post-Christmas break, we went live on the IHeartRadio platform and Amazon's podcast platform. Now, you can ask Alexa and Siri to play the Twelve Songs of Christmas podcast and let them pop it up on your voice-controlled personal assistant.

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

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