Ah, the joys of living near a great university. Especially one with a clever sense of humor and some amazing talent. Brown University's Classics Department produces a Christmas Carol Sing-Along and invites the public to join. The performance is in a gorgeous colonial church -- the First Baptist Church in America, located in Providence, Rhode Island. Decked out in holiday swags of greenery and red velvet ribbons, the mushroom-colored colonial millwork and crisp white walls seem especially fitting for this grand event. The pipe organ fills (and sometimes rattles) the great space.
When you walk in to the free-open-to-the-public event, you are handed a 24 page program with the words in the original Latin, Greek, Sanskrit, with most pieces translated into English (just in case you might not be 100% fluent in the original). There are 20 (or XX as the program says) pieces of music, readings and poetry. The emcee led the entire program in Latin. Behind her, above in a box, a young man held up signs indicating when to applaud ("Plaudite") or not (same, but encircled in red with a diagonal line through it).
The Christmas carols we sang included Nox Silens (Silent Night), O Urbs Pusilla Bethlehem (Oh Little Town of Bethlehem) and Ornate Ramosis Aulas (Deck the Halls). So much fun to belt out those songs in Latin, in a big wooden room with rattling walls and a forceful pipe organ.
A highlight was the Duodecim Dies Natales (Twelve Days of Christmas) sung by the sweet voices of the Chattertockarum (or ordinarily, the Chattertocks).
Such fun!