Winnipeg Free Press: Grateful Chorus
Winnipeg choirs embracing holiday season of song after long silence
Winnipeg Free Press
By: Alan Small
Posted: 7:00 PM CST Friday, Dec. 2, 2022
www.winnipegfreepress.com/arts-and-life
Yuri Klaz, Artistic Director & Conductor, The Winnipeg Singers
Groups such as the Winnipeg Singers, the Winnipeg Philharmonic Choir, the Winnipeg Boys Choir and others across the city have been silenced by the COVID-19 pandemic since their last Christmas performances in the winter of 2019.
The hush ends Sunday afternoon at the Crescent Arts Centre (525 Wardlaw Ave.) when the Winnipeg Singers present Lessons and Carols: A Canadian Christmas, which includes new choral works by Canadian composers such as Andrew Balfour, Mark Sirett, Steven Chatman and Dan Wiebe, as well as narrated essays by Gimli music researcher Muriel Smith that will link the story of Jesus Christ’s birth with contemporary issues such as diversity and equality.
The Singers got a jump on the season a week ago when they performed Lessons and Carols in Kelowna, B.C. They found they were as missed by a sold-out audience yearning to hear their voices as they were excited about being onstage again.
“Going to Kelowna and being able to sing, it makes you realize how much you’ve been missing it,” says Pat Wray, the Winnipeg Singers’ executive director and an alto vocalist in the group.
“The biggest impression you get is that a lot of it is precious, precise and beautiful music… It really shows off the singers in what we probably do best, unaccompanied, beautiful blends. It’ll definitely get people in the Christmas spirit.”
