The Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree won’t be lit for another month, but Darlene Love is already making her holiday plans, and they include another trip to Jimmy Fallon’s Tonight Show.
The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon will welcome the legendary singer back to perform “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” for the third consecutive year on Thursday, December 17. That’s according to Love herself, who announced the booking on social media this weekend.
As usual, she’ll be backed by longtime David Letterman bandleader Paul Shaffer, along with Steven Van Zandt’s Little Steven & the Disciples.
Love’s performance of her 1963 Christmas classic has quickly become Fallon’s preferred way to send The Tonight Show into its holiday break. She first brought the song to the show in 2024, then returned in 2025.
Of course, the tradition goes back much further than Fallon. Love first performed “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” on Late Night with David Letterman in 1986, with the performance ultimately becoming a near-annual event on Letterman’s shows, ending only with his retirement.
Letterman briefly revived the tradition for his YouTube channel in 2023. A few months later, Love revealed that she had spent nearly a decade trying to bring the song to The Tonight Show. Fallon had personally invited her, Love said, but the show’s music producer kept giving her “the runaround.”
The show finally made good on Fallon’s invitation later that year, giving one of late night’s most beloved holiday traditions a new home.
Love’s booking is the latest piece of Fallon’s Christmas machine whirring back to life. His SiriusXM channel, Holiday Seasoning Radio, returns for a third year today, and the host recently released a new holiday track, joining Cynthia Erivo on “Spending My Christmas With You.”
