Feliz Navidad

"Feliz Navidad" is a Christmas song written and first recorded in 1970 by Puerto Rican singer-songwriter José Feliciano. With its simple, heartfelt lyrics - the traditional Spanish Christmas/New Year greeting "Feliz Navidad, próspero año y felicidad" ("Merry Christmas, a prosperous year and happiness"), followed by text in English words "I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas from the bottom of my heart" - it has become a Christmas classic and has gained popularity around the world. In 2010, the 1970 recording of "Feliz Navidad" on RCA Victor Records by José Feliciano was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. Background and composition Feliciano says he recorded the song while feeling homesick at Christmas, missing his family in New York City and his extended family further afield as he sat in a studio in Los Angeles. He remembered celebrating Christmas Eve with his brothers, eating traditional Puerto Rican foods, drinking rum, and going caroling. "It was expressing the joy that I felt on Christmas and the fact that I felt very lonely," he told NPR in December 2020. "I missed my family, I missed Christmas carols with them. I missed the whole Christmas scene." Chart performance Feliciano's 1970 recording of "Feliz Navidad" (in which he plays both an acoustic guitar and a Puerto Rican cuatro) is one of the most downloaded and aired Christmas songs in the United States and Canada. As of November 25, 2016, total sales of the digital track stand at 808,000 downloads according to Nielsen SoundScan, placing it eighth on the list of all-time best-selling Christmas/holiday digital singles in SoundScan history. It was also recognized by ASCAP as one of the top 25 most played and recorded Christmas songs around the world.