Welcome to our 22nd season and our first full, formal holiday concert since 2019! It is so good to be back, and we wouldn’t have made it here without you—our audience—supporting us so generously and enthusiastically.
After an online season (2020-2021), we presented an informal, masked and distanced program in December 2021 at Tacoma Community College. May 2022 brought our first full-length concert since 2019—a milestone concert featuring the Fauré Requiem with orchestra at Kilworth Memorial Chapel at the University of Puget Sound (also masked and distanced).
Our 22nd season has a special energy. Not only are we rehearsing and performing in a location new to us, but we have also welcomed a dozen new singers to our ranks. And, after so many months of stringent protocols, we have the option to rehearse and to perform mask-free and in a more traditional
formation.
Each piece selected for Illuminations: Holiday Music from the Americas features a text, melody, and/or composer from this part of the world. Sources and influences span French Canada, the American Southwest, African American spirituals, a beloved Shaker hymn, and more. And many of the texts, whether sacred or secular, include light imagery (starlight, firelight, candlelight).
Thank you for making today’s concert part of your celebrations this year. Warm wishes to you and your family for Christmas and the New Year.
Kyle S. Haugen
NWRS Artistic Director