Orchestra celebrates Christmas

The+Mercyhurst+Civic+Orchestra+will+join+forces+with+the+Concert+Choir+to+present+their+Christmas+concert.+

Contributed photo

The Mercyhurst Civic Orchestra will join forces with the Concert Choir to present their Christmas concert.

Lauren Ganger, Staff writer

The Mercyhurst Civic Orchestra and the Mercyhurst Concert Choir will be collaborating for a Christmas Concert on Dec. 10 at 4 p.m. in the Mary D’Angelo Performing Arts Center.
The performance will feature Vivaldi’s Gloria in D Major, Prokofiev’s “Lieutenant Kijé Suite,” Ralph Vaughn Williams’s “Fantasia on Christmas Carols” and other Christmas favorites.
The Vivaldi Gloria is a popular piece for choir, soloists and orchestra.
The piece itself is one of Vivaldi’s most well-known choral works and is often performed as a Christmas piece.
It was originally composed for an all-female ensemble, but will be performed in its most common, modern form, which will include the entire mixed voice choir.
Auditions for the soprano and alto solos were Nov. 5, and the soloists will be announced soon.
The Prokofiev and the Vaughn Williams pieces will both feature James Bobick as baritone soloist.
Bobick was an adjunct instructor of Opera, Voice and Lyric Diction with the Mercyhurst Music department last year and will be returning to perform with the orchestra in December.
The Prokofiev piece is based on a Russian story about Lieutenant Kijé, a fictional officer who is used to take the blame for annoying the Tsar, rewarded and promoted, and then posthumously stripped of his rank all without ever having existed.
Prokofiev was commissioned to write the piece for a film version of the story, and it has since become a popular work of the orchestral repertoire.
The Vaughn Williams piece is an arrangement of several popular English folk Christmas carols, “The Truth Sent From Above,” “Come All You Worthy Gentlemen” and “Sussex Carol.”
It will feature the Mercyhurst Concert Choir as well.
The concert promises to be an afternoon of beautiful music that will put the Mercyhurst community in the mood for Christmas.
General admission tickets for this performance are $5, and tickets for Mercyhurst students, faculty and those 12 and under are $2.