While the UK Christmas Number 1 is billed as WHAM! here are the 5 other best Christmas songs and the crazy stories behind the festive hits

Wham! has secured the coveted Christmas number one position with Last Christmas, 39 years after it was denied by Band Aid’s Do They Know It’s Christmas?

It’s a remarkable success that will delight fans of George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley, but it’s not the only festive hit with an unusual journey to the top.

For example, Jingle Bells is one of the most popular Christmas songs of all time, but it wasn’t even meant for the holidays.

Meanwhile, there is confusion over whether the famous text from 12 Days of Christmas was really intended to refer to a partridge in a pear tree.

Here, Femail reveals the surprising stories behind some of the hottest festive favourites.

Jingle Bells

The song, written by Boston singer James Pierpoint in the 1850s, was initially called The One Horse Open Sleigh, as a Thanksgiving song, but it became so popular that it was used at Christmas.

The new name took place in 1857 and certain texts were adapted to the holidays.

The song is so iconic that it became the first song played in space by the crew of Gemini 6, who put bells and a harmonic in their spaceship.

12 days of Christmas

There is consensus among historians that this fun Christmas carol started out as a simple memory game after it was composed by Englishman Frederic Austin around 1909.

And linguists have noticed that there may also be a funny translation error at play. As you sing the song, you will notice how the list grows longer with each verse.

One of the lines: ‘A partridge in a pear tree’ is the source of this confusion. The English breed of bird typically ranges in fields, while the French partridge is often found in trees.

Since the French word for the bird is perdrix, they suspect that this word was mistaken for pear tree, which sounds almost identical to the first.

This left people wondering if the partridge was actually in a pear tree or if this was an English speaker’s poor command of French.

Sinterklaas is coming to town

This song was first written by James ‘Haven’ Gillespie in 1934, when it was also performed on a radio program.

The inspiration behind the song is said to be the songwriter’s grief for his brother after his death.

As soon as James found out his brother had died, he received a call from Eddie Cantor, a well-known radio host, asking him to write a Christmas song for his show.

Initially, the Kentucky singer, too deeply affected by grief, canceled the performance, but later returned as he learned how to channel a positive memory of his brother into the hit.

Inspired, he managed to write the song in just 15 minutes, and the song became an overnight sensation.

Silent Night

This hit is a Christmas carol and Joseph Mohr, an Austrian Roman Catholic priest, is often credited as the one responsible for writing the religious song.

It is said that the father was fond of music during his Christmas Eve service, although his church organ was broken.

To remedy this, he wrote a simple poem and asked musician Franz Gruber to compose something that did not require an organ.

But it turned out that a Catholic priest wrote the poem while stationed in a church in Austria, before asking Franz to write accompanying guitar music.

The pair sang the carol on Christmas Eve 1818, 40 years before they decided to translate the song into English, and it gained worldwide fame.

Fairy tale of New York

The well-known party hit was written in 1987 by the Irish band The Pogues, starring Kirsty MacColl.

This fun song has less of a religious undertone than some others, but is inspired by booze.

Elvis Costello, a friend of the band, suggested calling the song Christmas Eve in the Drunk Tank.

However, they didn’t really like this for whatever reason, so frontman Shane MacGowan, who tragically died last month, decided to name it after a 1973 novel by JP Donleavy.