Keene State’s music department rang in the holiday season with bells — the bells of their tubas, that is.
Faculty, students and members of the Keene community gathered at the Mabel Brown Room on Sunday, Dec. 4 for the annual KSC Tuba Christmas performance. This year marked the 49th year of Tuba Christmas, the worldwide event that brings holiday cheer to parts of New England, Canada, Australia and even Costa Rica. The KSC performance was directed by Dr. John Hart and featured Doug Nelson, KSC professor emeritus and founder of the KSC Tuba Christmas.
Hart and the ensemble showcased holiday classics such as “Carol of the Bells,” “Silent Night,” “Jingle Bells,” and Tuba Christmas performance staple “Joy Tuba World.” Nelson conducted “O Hark the Herald Angels Sing” and “Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming.”
To go along with the instruments, the audience was encouraged to sing along to the lyrics projected on a screen behind the ensemble.
Hart mentioned that most people that sign up have performed in multiple Tuba Christmases, but new people are also encouraged.
“Since most everybody who comes to our event has done at least one Tuba Christmas before… they’ve been practicing for a week or two, dusting off the tuba,” Hart said. “I know one person that is coming to our event generally takes two weeks off work this time of year and gets into his RV and travels the Eastern seaboard going from Tuba Christmas to Tuba Christmas.” Hart described the experience of conducting Tuba Christmas as being opportunistic.
“You never know what you’re gonna get because you don’t know who’s in the group until they’re sitting in front of you and that’s kind of the fun part of it,” Hart said. In an email sent to The Equinox, Nelson described the history behind Tuba Christmas in the town of Keene.
“The first two Tuba Christmases in Keene were organized by first involving many of the KSC music majors… several high school and middle school students participated, as did school music teachers,” Nelson said. “We started with about 15 players and numbers increased exponentially.”
Additionally, Nelson said that Tuba Christmas is an event that educates and marvels audiences year after year.
“The underlining purpose of the Tuba Christmas events throughout the nation and beyond is to educate our audiences to what marvelous sounds are produced by these big, metal instruments,” Nelson said. “Typically, the new members of our audiences go home marveling over the gorgeous sounds they heard.”
Hart said that the event is a great way to ring in the holidays.
“For a lot of people, myself included, it’s sort of the gateway into the holiday season… this is a nice way to kick things off in a very quirky way,” Hart said.
Hart added, “It is amateur music making, which is something that’s near and dear to my heart. I’m a strong advocate for community music, making community bands in particular so this is a nice way to stay in touch with that.”
Nicole Dumont can be contacted at
ndumont@kscequinox.com
