Today’s Holiday Tune: See odd couple David Bowie and Bing Crosby perform “Peace on Earth/The Little Drummer Boy”

Bing Crosby and David Bowie teamed up for a most unlikely of duets for Bing’s 1977 holiday special.

Bowie reportedly thought The Little Drummer Boy was all wrong for him and initially refused to sing it with Bing.  Then a team of composers and writers frantically retooled the song and added another melody and new lyrics as a counterpoint to all those pah-rumpa-pum-pums. They called it Peace on Earth.

Bowie liked it. More important, Bowie sang it.

The duet has gone from oddity to a holiday chestnut in the years since and was even released as a single in 1982.

Bowie was 30 at the time and Crosby 73. They recorded the duet on Sept. 11, 1977 and a month later, Crosby was dead of a heart attack. The special was broadcast on CBS about a month after his death.