The Wartburg Community Symphony’s annual holiday concert will feature music of the season and a unique version of Charles Dickens’“A Christmas Carol”presented by a cast of area residents.
The concert begins at 2 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 13, in Neumann Auditorium. A preconcert Beyond the Music conversation with Conductor Rebecca Nederhiser begins at 1 p.m., and the UNI Suzuki Fiddlesticks ensemble will perform in the lobby before the concert under the direction of Bethany Washington.
“Featuring a British author in our American Tapestries season seems appropriate for this concert,” said Nederhiser, noting that Dickens’ work has become an enduring tradition of the U.S. holiday season.
The concert will open with Leroy Anderson’s “Sleigh Ride,” conducted by Waverly-Shell Rock fifth-grader Lennon Shanks. Other works on the program include “Fantasia on ‘Greensleeves’” by Ralph Vaughan Williams, “Christmas Festival” by Leroy Anderson
and “Christmas Overture” by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor.
Following intermission, the orchestra will provide background music for a readers theatre performance of “A Christmas Carol.” The cast includes Wartburg Board of Regents member Jim Loveridge as Scrooge, plus Wartburg faculty and staff Ellen Engh, Heidi Keller, Zak Montgomery, Sonja Lynch, Brian Pfaltzgraff, Kyle Fleming, Terry Letsche, Nathan Landes, Sarah Voels and Michael Bechtel. Also featured are Jordan Bancroft, executive director of the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Symphony; Jim Gates, producer of the Shell Rock Swing Show; and recent Wartburg graduate Matthias Letsche. Tickets are available at the door with cash, check or credit card or online with credit card at wartburg.edu/symphony. Individual adult tickets are $20. Youth 18 and younger and Wartburg College students are admitted free.
