Mariah Carey reflects on 30 years as Queen of Christmas

"I felt it was too early in my career," she said in a recent interview, recalling the early 1990s.

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When the record company came knocking, American singer-songwriter Mariah Carey was not sure about making a Christmas album.

But she had always loved Christmas, and so she got to work on arrangements for some of her favourite seasonal classics, like Joy To The World and Silent Night, and filled her studio with vibrant decorations like trees and lights. All she and her American writing partner Walter Afanasieff needed were some original songs.

Then one late night, she recalled, the distinctive opening melody line of one song came to her as she tapped it out on a small Casio keyboard - "ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding", she sang over Zoom.

For the lyrics, she said, she racked her brain for something that felt meaningful. Then, "I started thinking about: 'I don't want a lot for Christmas'".

Thirty years after its release in 1994, that song, All I Want For Christmas Is You, has become one of the longest-charting singles in any genre, spending 65 weeks on Billboard's Hot 100, and perhaps the best-known original holiday song of the last half-century.