December 11 – 3:00pm
| What: | “Sounds of Christmas” with Goshen Community Chorale |
| When: | 3:00pm, Sunday, December 11, 2011 |
| Where: | Goshen College Music Center, Sauder Concert Hall |
October 16, 2011 - “Sounds of Christmas” will offer joyful music of the season by the Goshen Community Chorale and the Maple City Chamber Orchestra in a joint concert on Sunday, December 11 at 3 p.m. in Sauder Concert Hall at Goshen College. The concert is free and open to the public.
The major work on the program will be a cantata new to the Michiana area, “Christmas Cantata–The Incarnation,” written in 2000 by K. Lee Scott (b. 1950), an American who has become a leading composer of music for the church.
The cantata consists of six movements in a mix of classical and folk styles that show influence by British composers Ralph Vaughan Williams and John Rutter. Texts come from the Gospel of John and poetry by Charles Wesley, Christina Rossetti and others.
Lee Dengler, choral conductor, says that “the music is at times dramatic and declamatory and other times lyrical and expressive.”
Another major section of the program will include four numbers from the Christmas section of Handel’s “The Messiah,’” including “And the Glory of the Lord,” “For unto Us a Child Is Given,” and “Glory to God.”
Other short, popular works on the program include John Rutter’s “Donkey Carol,” Mack Wilberg’s “I Saw Three Ships,” and Leroy Anderson’s “Sleigh Ride” and “A Christmas Festival.”
Vocal soloists include Merle Sommers, Allen Peachey, Bob Brenneman, Susan Dengler and Peggy Scherger. A brass ensemble from the orchestra will accompany the chorus in Daniel Pinkham’s “Christmas Cantata.”
This free concert is made possible, in part, by the Indiana Arts Commission, with funding from the National Endowment for the Arts.
The 45-member volunteer orchestra, conducted by Brian Mast, was founded in 1996 by Goshen native Michael Ruhling, now associate professor of Fine Arts/Music at the Rochester (NY) Institute of Technology. The orchestra offers an e-mail newsletter, obtainable through its website www.mcco-online.org.
The 55-member Goshen Community Chorale was organized in 1982 by Doyle Preheim, then Professor of Music at Goshen College, and incorporated in 1993. For more information about the chorus contact LeeDengler@comcast.net.
