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The co-writer and co-producer behind Mariah Carey‘s All I Want For Christmas Is You claims that the diva has spun a ‘tall tale’ about the origin of the holiday hit.
Mariah has previously claimed that she wrote the song as a child on her Casio keyboard, but her former collaborator Walter Afanasieff says that this is untrue.
Speaking to the Hot Takes & Deep Dives podcast, Afanasieff claims that he and Carey created the song together shortly after collaborating on her blockbuster 1993 album Music Box.
The co-writer and co-producer behind Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas Is You claims that the diva lied about how the song was created. Mariah is pictured in 2010
‘We were both on the same page about how we wrote All I Want For Christmas Is You, there was never any alternate story until probably 10 years ago,’ he said.
‘When she started to hint at the fact that, “Oh, I wrote that song when I was a little girl!” But why weren’t you saying that for 12 or 13 or 15 years prior to that? So it just sort of developed in her mind,’ he continued.
‘She doesn’t play anything, she doesn’t play keyboard or piano. She doesn’t understand music, she doesn’t know chord changes and music theory or anything like that. She doesn’t know a diminished chord from a minor seventh chord to a major seventh chord.
‘So to claim that she wrote a very complicated chord-structured song with her finger on a Casio keyboard when she was a little girl, it’s kind of a tall tale.’
Mariah’s former collaborator Walter Afanasieff (pictured) says that he created the song with the Vision of Love singer during a songwriting session, while she claims that she wrote the song as a child on her Casio keyboard
When asked to explain how the track really came about, Afanasieff said that he and the diva came up with it together while working on three original songs for her then-upcoming Christmas album, Merry Christmas.
The pair had already previously worked on a number of her studio albums together, including Emotions and Music Box.
Both Afanasieff and Carey are equally credited for All I Want For Christmas Is You with no other writers or producers.
‘We were holed up in this beautiful home that they were renting, and it was the summertime and there was a piano,’ he said.
‘So the writing of All I Want For Christmas is, I started playing a boogie-woogie, kind of a rock,’ he continued, before mimicking the sound of the song’s bassline.
Afanasieff said that he was sitting at the piano playing, when Mariah chimed in and started singing ‘I don’t want a lot for Christmas.’
‘So on and on, and it was like a game of pingpong. I’d hit the ball to her, she hits it back to me.’
Afanasieff said that the diva was largely responsible for the melodies and lyrics, while he did the music and the chords.
All I Want For Christmas Is You was released in 1994 as part of Mariah’s Merry Christmas album and went on to become one of the most successful holiday songs of all time
‘I’ve studied music, I have degrees in music. I’m an accomplished orchestrator and arranger. I teach music. I’m not a schlump. I don’t play by ear,’ he added.
He won the 1999 Grammy Award in the Record of the Year category for producing ‘My Heart Will Go On’ by Celine Dion.
Mariah told Billboard magazine in 2017 that she came up with All I Want For Christmas when she was ‘a kid’, telling the publication: ‘I am proud of this song that I wrote basically as a kid on my little Casio keyboard.’
Two years later, she told a more detailed version of the story to Cosmopolitan magazine, but did not say that she was a child when she wrote it.
‘I just sat down, decorated a little tree and put on It’s A Wonderful Life and tried to get into that mood,’ she mused.
‘Then I sat in this small room with a keyboard and started doing little melodies and stuff. I was going over all the things I think about at Christmas time that make me happy and how to turn it around and make it into a love song.’
‘I am proud of this song that I wrote basically as a kid on my little Casio keyboard!’ Mariah has often claimed that she wrote the song as a child
She repeated this story in the Amazon Music documentary ‘Mariah Carey is Christmas: The Story of ‘All I Want for Christmas Is You’ in 2019.
‘I was living in this house, upstate in New York. Actually, I put on It’s a Wonderful Life downstairs. You could hear it throughout the house,’ she shared.
‘And I went into this small room and there was a little keyboard in there. And I started playing. And I’m a terrible piano player, right? Sometimes it’ll be like a happy accident.’
Her story seems to line up with Afanasieff’s version of events, although Mariah did not mention that he was also in the room with her on the piano.
Afanasieff has publicly pushed back against Carey’s version of events multiple times over the years, and as a result he claims that the diva’s fans have trolled him and his wife on social media.
‘Mariah has been very wonderful, positive and a force of nature. She’s the one that made the song a hit and she’s awesome,’ he told Variety in 2019.
The hitmaker is pictured in the music video for All I Want For Christmas Is You
‘But she definitely does not share credit where credit is due. As a result, it has really hurt my reputation, and as a result, has left me with a bittersweet taste in my mouth.’ he continued.
‘Because here it is, such a wonderful, huge event for me, yet my life is being threatened on the Internet, because Mariah fans are accusing me of stealing from her.’
All I Want For Christmas Is You was released in 1994 and went on to become one of the most successful holiday songs of all time.
It returns to the top of the charts every year around December and is now a big hit on streaming services with younger listeners.
Afanasieff has publicly pushed back against Carey’s version of events multiple times over the years, and as a result he claims that the diva’s fans have trolled him on social media
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