Merry Christmas!

by ChessBase
12/25/2025 – We wish all chess friends and readers a merry and peaceful Christmas. For a musical accompaniment, Grandmaster Jonathan Levitt provides a special Christmas song. | Photo: Buffy
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A musical Christmas greeting from Jonathan Levitt

Jonathan Levitt has recorded a full album of Christmas songs, which can be listened to on Spotify.

Born in 1963, Levitt studied mathematics for a time and played in numerous chess tournaments, including the team championships of the British Four Nations League. He was awarded the International Master title in 1984 and became a Grandmaster in 1990. His greatest tournament success came in 2005, when he shared first place at the Howard Staunton Memorial together with Jon Speelman, held at Simpson’s-in-the-Strand.

Alongside his playing career, Levitt worked as a chess columnist for Oxford Today and, for a period, also for Kasparov Chess. He published several books, including Genius in Chess. From 1988 to 2005, Levitt taught chess at the City of London School. He was also active in chess composition, serving as a judge in problem-solving competitions and composing problems himself. In 1996 and 1997, he organised the Batsford School Chess Problem Championships. For a time, he earned his living through the successful placement of cricket bets.

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Video

60m English New ideas in the Najdorf_E

‘New ideas in the Najdorf – a Power Play 18 Update’ aims to complement Daniel King’s popular DVD from last year ‘The Sicilian Najdorf - a repertoire for Black’. Such a dynamic and popular opening as the Najdorf is developing the whole time. On this download, Daniel King updates lines that were included on his DVD but also responds to viewers’ requests, considering lines that he omitted from his original repertoire. The lines examined on this update are: • 1 e4 c5 2 Nf3 d6 3 d4 cxd4 4 Nxd4 Nf6 5 Nc3 a6 6 h3 e5 7 Nde2 • 5….a6 6 Bc4 in combination with the English Attack (Be3, f3 etc) • 5…a6 6 Be3 and the …a5 variation • 5…a6 6 Be2 and 9 Re1 • 5 f3 (instead of 5 Nc3) It isn’t necessary to have seen the original Najdorf DVD to understand the lines examined here – but it would help as they form part of a complete repertoire.