Orrin Hatch's Hanukkah tune is his gift to Jewish people

WASHINGTON — The canon of Hanukkah songs written by Mormon senators from Utah just got a little bigger.

Sen. Orrin Hatch, a solemn-faced Republican with a soft spot for

Jews and a love of Barbra Streisand, has penned a catchy holiday tune,

"Eight Days of Hanukkah."

The video was posted Tuesday night on Tablet, an online magazine of Jewish lifestyle and culture, just in time for Hanukkah.Known around the Senate as a prolific writer of Christian hymns and

patriotic melodies, Hatch, 75, said this was his first venture into

Jewish music. It will not be his last.

"Anything I can do for the Jewish people, I will do," Hatch said in

an interview before heading to the Senate floor to debate an abortion

amendment. "Mormons believe the Jewish people are the chosen people,

just like the Old Testament says."

In short, he loves the Jews. And based on an early sampling of listeners, the feeling could be mutual.

"Watching Orrin Hatch in the studio, I said to myself that nothing

this great will ever happen to me again," said Alana Newhouse, the

editor-in-chief of Tablet.

Set against a bouncy synthesizer beat, the song begins:

"Hanukkah, oh Hanukkah,

The festival of light/

In Jerusalem,

The oil burned bright."

Adding to the project's only-in-America mishmash is that the song is

performed by Rasheeda Azar, a Syrian-American vocalist from Indiana.

But Hatch is the song's unquestioned prime mover, or macher. He is

featured in the video, sitting stoic in the studio, head bobbing

slightly, donning earphones and contributing backup vocals.

The song's contagious refrain goes: