CBS: Christmas Music from Three Centuries

Design by David Lance Goins used for the California Bach Society poster

As expected, California Bach Society (CBS) has prepared its next program for the holiday season. The full title of the program will be Laudate Coeli: Songs of Light in Winter’s Deep. (Note that, like the first program of the season last month, the title couples Latin and English!) Artistic Director Nate Widelitz will conduct. The vocal soloists will be soprano Rita Lilly, mezzo Mindy Ella Chu, tenor Corey Head, and bass Chung-Wai Soong. Instrumental accompaniment by strings, organ, and harp will be provided by members of the Jubilate Baroque Orchestra.

The program will be based on three centuries, but they will not be consecutive. The earliest composers will be from the seventeenth century: Dietrich Buxtehude (the BuxWV 13 for mixed chorus, strings, and continuo, “Das neugeborne Kindelein”) and two selections by Marc-Antoine Charpentier, “In nativitatem Domini canticum” (H.314) and one of the ten settings of the Magnificat canticle. The seventeenth century is then elided with two nineteenth-century compositions: the Oratorio de Noël by Camille Saint-Saëns and “O Heiland, reiß die Himmel auf,” the second of the two Opus 74 sacred motets for unaccompanied mixed choir composed by Johannes Brahms. Finally, the twentieth-century composer will be Hugo Distler, whose oratorio Die Weihnachtsgeschichte (the Christmas story) is based on the hymn, “Es ist ein Ros entsprungen”(a rose has sprung up).

The San Francisco performance of this program will take place at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, December 5. The venue will be the Trinity+St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, which is located 1620 Gough Street. Individual tickets are available for general admission at $40 with discounted rates for seniors and students. A Web page has been created for such tickets, as well as for three-concert subscriptions, which will also include the February and May performance at St. Mark’s Lutheran Church. Doors will open at 7 p.m.