It’s no secret that when the holiday season comes around there is something magical in the air. Collectively we seem to feel more cheerful, optimistic, and excited. Maybe it’s just the cold winter air rouging our cheeks, or maybe it’s seeing the first snowfall that covers everything in a blanket of dazzling white crystals, or perhaps it is the sound of familiar holiday music that encompasses our world at this time of year.

​

We open our festive concert with works by two British composers: one living and actively composing, and the other who passed away in 1934.  A Joyful Noel, by British composer Andrew Wainwright (b. 1981), is the exciting opening piece that fuses the familiar tunes of “Joy to the World” and “The First Nöel," linked by a Celtic-style dance. The work features several brass fanfares and explodes into a rousing and dramatic finale that will bring a smile to your face. 

Our second piece is Sleigh Ride, but not the one you with which might be very familiar. This version by Englishman Frederick Delius (1862–1934) is the second movement from his Three Small Tone Poems depicting the seasons. In Delius' Sleigh Ride we are transported out to a quiet, wintry country lane when, from a distance, we hear the distinctive jingle of sleigh bells approaching. Soon we see the horse-drawn sleigh travel by us and finally disappear into the twilight of the frosty landscape.

Our wonderful Great Falls Symphonic Choir next joins the celebrations with two works of contrasting character. The Many Moods of Christmas, Suite 2, is part of a collection of holiday-themed works by the legendary choral conductor, Robert Shaw (1916–1999), arranged for orchestra by Robert Russell Bennett. The suite opens with the choir singing a beautiful Latin prayer a cappella before the orchestra charges off into a brisk, festive introduction. The choir rejoins them to sing a series of familiar Christmas carols: "Joy to the World," "Away in a Manger," and the French carol, "Fum, Fum, Fum." Keep your ears open for an additional tune from Handel’s Messiah intermixed within movements as well. 

Following Shaw’s work, the choir shifts into a more reflective and poignant mood as they transport us to a quiet, intimate scene with The Other Night, written by Utah-based composer John Paul Hayward (b. 1990). The poem’s text is a 15th-century anonymous English carol (Thys Endris Night). Here we listen to a beautiful lullaby sung by a mother to her newborn child.