Christmas cheer with Pro Carmine
Pro Carmine choir is offering a welcome drink and mince pie to everyone attending their annual end-of-year concert next week (Wednesday), which once again is in aid of the Grocott’s Mail Christmas Cheer Fund.
The choir says that the programme is a varied one including some old favourites such as Gaudete, Adam Lay Ybounden and Christmas is Coming.
There are also some newer pieces introduced last year: a Kyrie based on French carol tunes by Marc-Antoine Charpentier which features three soloists (two tenors and one bass), a modern setting of a traditional lullaby, Dormi Jesu, by Peter Aston, and Shepherds, Come by Neil Saunders.
Brand new works include the rousing Weihnachten by Mendelssohn and two modern arrangements by English composer Peter Gritton: the swinging Follow that Star and an uplifting version of the Christmas favourite, Mary’s Boy Child.
Pro Carmine is coming to the end of a busy six months of singing and fund-raising. In September they gave a successful concert in the NELM foyer that resulted in over R3 000 for the Lebone Centre’s Project Read.
At the end of October, their three-concert tour to Bedford, Cradock and Graaff-Reinet raised nearly R4 500 for various local charities. They then sang to a full St John’s Church in Bathurst (as part of the Bathurst Country Affair), which garnered R3 300 for the Sunshine Coast Feeding Scheme.
“We are an amateur choir and people are part of it because of the pure pleasure of singing as part of a group,” says choirmaster, Peter Breetzke.
“It is an added bonus to be able to do some good through our performances. This cycle of concerts has been particularly effective and we’re extremely grateful to all our audiences who came and who were so generous.”
Entrance to the concert is free but there will be a collection for the Grocott’s Mail Christmas Cheer Fund which this year is supporting Grahamstown Child Welfare, celebrating its centenary in 2017.
More specifically, funds raised will go to the Ikhaya Losizo Cluster Foster Home Scheme to help them continue providing a safe and loving environment for 20 vulnerable children between the ages of 2 and 18.
So, come and get yourself into the holiday mood and raise money for an important cause. The concert is at 7pm, Wednesday 30 November at Christ Church in Speke Street. Come a little early for that drink and mince pie.