Christmas Concert

For more years than I can remember I have been involved with the Christmas concert. My official title is the Stage Manager but in reality I help the classes get on and get off the stage. That is a lot harder to do than most people think, especially if your are herding 40+ sensory overloaded kindergartners to the front for their first school concert. We give our concert in a large downtown church so these children have never seen the building or the stage and once they get up there parents and Grandparents are waving and aiming video and digital cameras at them. But they usually perform beautifully and in reality, for the Ks, who really cares. The cuteness factors carries them far.

The other primary grades usually go with out a hitch and the main event of the evening is the program of acting and song given by the Grade 5/6 choir. This year there are narrators, shepherds, magi, an innkeeper, Mary and Joseph of course and many soloists and a stage full of Orff instruments. (Xylophone type things for those who don't know.) With little time to put all the parts together, its always a big scary when the classes go to the church for the dress rehearsal the morning before the concert. But today's run through went well. The church had remodeled and put a tree that COULD NOT be moved in the middle of the choir area. So a well thought out plan had to be quickly reworked. Elementary children always speak too quickly and never use mikes properly but I think that is one of the reasons we go through this exercise year after year. They get better. But our Mary and Joseph this year have a problem. They don't like each other and are not willing to take on their characters and get passed it. I finally threatened to put a tape X where their bums should be and where their feet should be so that they would at least turn towards each other at the creche but trying to get Joseph to put his hand on Mary's elbow to guide her away from the inn to the stable is beyond their repertoire. The choir's singing is beautiful - even the guys who are getting "cool" in Grade 6 participate. There is a boy with a solo in Stille Nacht that makes everyone stop, listen and often wipe away a tear. It will be a good concert.

I love going to concerts at this time of year from Messiah to Steve Bell to the Winnipeg Singers (Kayla sings with them) to the efforts of these children. Listening to the songs of Christmas, the same songs, year after year with such a variety of voices never gets old. Some old grumpy voice in the back of my head occasionally hisses, is this really the TRUE meaning of Christ's birth, shouldn't we be more God focused? But sometimes we think too much and just experience too little. Christ's birth is about light and life and love and I am going to go with it and hopefully experience that at all the concerts I attend this year.