Extend Your Holiday

[Steve Marcus]

Previous recordings of our orchestra have been posted with password encryption, due to Union regulations, so that they would be available ostensibly only for orchestra members.

But a recording of this year's Holiday Concert made its way onto the orchestra's website and is accessible to the public. So if you are inclined to extend your Christmas music listening for just a bit longer this year, you can hear the live performance, with no editing, at http://www.parkridgecivicorchestra.org/hearus.html.

The tuba and I were sitting almost in the stage left wing with hanging curtains in an old former movie theater, no shell directly behind seat (although it did reflect other players' sounds, it didn't extend far enough to reach the side of the stage), and who knows what quality of miking was used. Nevertheless, it'll be in the right channel.

Part 1 contains Tchaikovsky Romeo & Juliet and Peter Maxwell Davies' An Orkney Wedding with Sunrise.

Part 2 contains O Holy Night and Dmitri Tiomkin's music from the soundtrack to It's a Wonderful Life.

Part 3 contains Leroy Anderson Sleigh Ride, very Hollywoodish arrangements of White Christmas and Mel Tormé's The Christmas Song (actually, there are a few decent tuba licks in those two arrangements), Bob Lowdon's Armed Forces Salute that we can all play in our sleep (but it's nice to have the chorus doing a decent job), and Alfred Reed's arrangement of America the Beautiful (as ubiquitous as it is, I prefer Carmen Dragon's arrangement).

Warning: The conductor provides long verbal introductions.

Please enjoy.