This week marks the “real” opening of Christmas season for GRAMMY-nominated, five-time GMA Dove Award winning artist Brandon Heath and his devoted fans. With the recent release of the singer/songwriter’s first Christmas album, Christmas Is Here, Heath’s highly viewed, tongue-in-cheek online campaign has been pounding the message that Christmas music and displays should be reserved for after Thanksgiving. The campaign has already reached more than 5.8 million fans.
Heath wrote the album’s lead track “The Day After Thanksgiving” explaining his position and rallying support with an online petition and hashtag #ChristmasIsntHereYet on his Twitter account. Thousands of fans have viewed his humorous videos, which depict Heath debating with his record label staff the start of the Christmas music season.
*View videos here: http://is.gd/Attxnq
*Petition here: http://bit.ly/christmaspetition
Debuting at radio this week, the album single “Just A Girl” is the No. 1 “New & Active” track on Billboard’s Christian AC Monitored chart. The song, written by Heath, captures his signature storytelling style relating the innkeeper’s perspective who turns Mary and Joseph away in the Christmas story. Heath offers, “God is often giving us opportunities we don’t realize the significance of, but we just need to say yes. God can do things though ordinary people. Mary was just a girl, but she was also a catalyst in a huge event in the rest of history.”
Tomorrow evening via his web site, www.BrandonHeath.net, Heath will host an online event streaming live from his house in Nashville at 10 p.m. ET/ 9 p.m. CT. For an hour, he will perform and offer behind-the-scenes highlights from Christmas Is Herewhile also taking questions from participants.
The Christmas fun continues on tour with Brandon through December as part of tobyMac’s “Hits Deep” ensemble, with Mandisa, Jamie Grace, Colton Dixon, Chris August and Capital Kings. At each tour stop, Heath submits a visual clue thru his @brandonheath Twitter account for the location where his “Eddie the Elf” character has hidden concert tickets and meet-and-greet passes for the show.
Throughout spring 2014, Heath will continue the “Hits Deep” tour with tobyMac, while also co-headlining additional dates with Mandisa as part of the pair’s popular “BranDisa” tour.
About Christmas Is Here: Emmy Award-winning, five-time GRAMMY nominee Brandon Heath released his first holiday offeringChristmas Is Here on Oct.15, 2013. Rich in musical diversity, Christmas Is Here takes listeners on a nostalgic journey through the most anticipated time of the year. “I want people to just hear a song and slip back into the past,” Heath says. “Good Christmas music is really about sparking people’s memories.” The album includes seven newly recorded holiday classics and three original tracks including radio single “Just A Girl.” Five hundred copies of Christmas Is Here will be available on vinyl, exclusively thruwww.BrandonHeath.net, giving fans the chance to experience Heath’s preferred method of listening to holiday music.
