Celeste Is The Singer Behind The John Lewis Christmas Advert
The British soul singer Celeste has shared her original composition, A Little Love, for the new John Lewis Christmas advert.
Celeste, who is 26 and was raised in Saltdean, near Brighton, released her debut single Daydreaming in October 2016, following it up with the EP The Milk & The Honey in February 2017, while her self-titled debut album will be released on Polydor in January 2021.
In what has become an annual tradition, TV viewers were intrigued as to what John Lewis would create for what has been a very peculiar year. In times gone by, the company has offered up beautiful and memorable festive cover songs including versions of The Smiths‘ Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want (Slow Moving Millie), Oasis’ Half The World Away (Aurora) and Keane’s Somewhere Only We Know (Lily Allen).
In a slight shift in routine, this year Celeste’s song is an original composition, and a soul song to boot, moving away from the gentle pop viewers have become used to. It does, however, hark back the gorgeous melodies of early soul performers, such as Billie Holiday with its gentle jazz sound.
The advert, which is largely animated, focuses on community, support and kindness, rather than making any overt calls for gift-giving, in a year where people have been thrown together and new traditions have been forged in the face of a global pandemic. John Lewis went so far as to commission eight different animators to work on the advert, in a bid to help the creative community who have found their work and incomes hit hard by Covid-19.
Furthermore, John Lewis have announced the Give A Little Love charity initiative, which aims to raise £5 million over the Christmas period to help 100,000 families, working alongside the food distribution charities Home-Start and FareShare, who’ve been championed by Footballer and Activist Marcus Rashford.
You can watch Celeste’s John Lewis Christmas Advert below:
A very special announcement ❣️For this year’s @jlandpartners and @waitrose Christmas advert I had the chance to write an original song it’s called A Little Love ✨??✨?? You can watch the advert on YouTube now at https://t.co/snJp2myAe9 ✨ #GiveALittleLove
— Celeste (@celeste) November 13, 2020