Staples Community Christmas Concert to feature boys' choir
STAPLES -- The Community Christmas Concert on Dec. 14 at Sacred Heart Church in Staples will feature the Central Minnesota Boys' Choir. The show will be 7:30 p.m.
The choir is in its third season and last appeared in the Community Christmas Concert two years ago in its inaugural season. Also appearing will be the Staples Area Men's Chorus, the Staples Area Women's Chorus and the Community Brass Ensemble.
The Central Minnesota Boys' Choir has grown artistically and musically over the last three years. This year the choir numbers 35 boys from Aldrich, Bertha, Brainerd, Browerville, Deer Creek, Motley, New York Mills, Park Rapids, Staples, Verndale and Wadena.
Another change in this year's concert is the return to Sacred Heart Church in Staples after a hiatus of 10 years.
If you go
Who: Central Minnesota Boys' Choir, Staples Area
Men's Chorus, Staples Area Women's Chorus and the Community Brass Ensemble
What: Community Christmas Concert
Where: Sacred Heart Church, Staples
When: 7:30 p.m. Dec. 14
Cost: $10, adults and $5, students in advance; $12, adults and $6, students at he door; call (218) 894-5416 or 800-213-6877
"We are delighted to share this wonderful acoustical setting with our audiences once more," said Stan Carlson, Staples Men's Chorus music director. "Centennial Auditorium in Staples is also a great hall and we will be returning there for our bi-annual major work concert next year, but Sacred Heart Church is a very special place for choirs with its wonderful upper register acoustical qualities. It's one of our recording engineer's five or six most favorite places to record."
All the choirs will combine to sing the Charles Ives' "Christmas Carol" and Paul Brandvik's newly published arrangement of the traditional Polish carol, "Lulajze, Jezuniu." Other music will include a mixture of old and new, familiar and non-familiar.
The boys' choir will sing the French carol "He is Born," and a new piece by former King's Singer, Bob Chilcott, called "Mid-Winter." The women's chorus will sing Schubert's "Gloria" and Michael Praetorius' Christmas Standard, "Lo, How A Rose," as well as Jester Hairston's spiritual, "Mary's Little Boy Child."
The men's chorus will contribute such pieces as Leontovich's "Carol of the Bells" and Norman Luboff's arrangement of the Spanish carol, "A La Nanita Nana," along with Joseph M. Martin's new composition, "Come To The Music."
The men's and women's choruses will combine to sing some of the season's music for mixed choir, including Alice Parker's "God Rest You Merry," Katherine K. Davis' "Carol of the Drum" and renaissance composer Nicolas Gombert's "Ave Maria," which the choirs will sing antiphonally from separate balconies of the church.
For tickets call the Centennial Auditorium Box Office at (218) 894-5416 or 800-213-6877. Tickets are $10 for adults and $5 for students in advance, and $12 for adults and $6 for students at the door.