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Some Christmas songs are obviously jokes. “Santa Tell Me” by Ariana Grande designed to be a joke, even though it doesn’t seem humorous. A songwriter had the idea for the song while he was taking a shower.

Ariana Grande’s ‘Santa Tell Me’ was written by writers from Iran and India

Grande co-wrote “Santa Tell Me” with Savan Kotecha and Ilya Salmanzadeh. During a 2022 interview with Songwriting, Kotecha revealed the song was a bit of an inside joke. “As a crew, it was just this energy and this feeling,” he said. “I always used to get ideas in the shower. I think we must have been talking about a Christmas song, me and Ilya. We thought it would be funny because he’s Iranian, and I’m Indian – we were like, ‘That could be funny if we wrote a Christmas song.'” For context, people in Iran and India rarely celebrate Christmas, as Iran is mostly Muslim and India is mostly Hindu.

“I think that he was in Sweden at the time,” he added. “I know it was in July. I was in the shower in LA and it just came into my head. I have the voice note somewhere. I just stepped out of the shower, got water all over the phone and I recorded it. I don’t know if that was the first voice note, but I said, ‘Hey, Ilya, check this out as a Christmas song … for Ari,’ or I got out of the shower and recorded it again.”

Ariana Grande made a bold choice

“Santa Tell Me” is different from most popular Christmas tunes. A lot of the older ones, like “Frosty the Snow Man” and “White Christmas,” are traditional pop songs. Others, like “All I Want for Christmas Is You” and “Last Christmas,” represent more recent genres of pop music. Meanwhile, “Santa Tell Me” is a modern R&B track. It was pretty bold of Grande to put out an R&B holiday song, considering few are popular besides “This Christmas” by Donny Hathaway.

Regardless, the tune remains ubiquitous. Perhaps that’s because it stands out from the pack. Or maybe it’s just because Grande is one of the most famous musicians on earth. It’s also possible that audiences wanted a new Christmas song to enter heavy rotation since the Christmas song canon was essentially frozen between the mid-1990s and the mid-2010s. 

‘Santa Tell Me’ took awhile to become a hit

“Santa Tell Me” was a bit of a slow-burner, but, eventually, it became a big hit. So far, the tune peaked at No. 11 on the Billboard Hot 100, staying on the chart for 26 weeks. Considering that popular Christmas songs have a habit of recharting, it wouldn’t be surprising if “Santa Tell Me” became a top 10 single someday. It could even become a No. 1 hit!

“Santa Tell Me” appeared on Grande’s EP Christmas Kisses. That record did not chart on the Billboard 200. Later, a “Naughty version” of “Santa Tell Me” was part of the album Christmas & Chill. That album reached No. 34 on the Billboard 200 and remained on the chart for three weeks.

“Santa Tell Me” became a Yuletide classic for many younger people even though its writers didn’t mean for it to be taken seriously. 

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