Last night was the final regular choral rehearsal for Messiah. Our director had met with the orchestra for the first time. He had tried to explain to them the emotional content he was going for, and what the words say, and stuff like that.

The orchestra’s attitude, he said: “Yeah, yeah, we get it, they’re going to be singing.”

I hope he misinterpreted their response. Here’s what we were working on at the time, “Glory to God,” with planets. Also the “Amen” from the same source, with both planets and other stuff. Nice way to start the morning, really.

When I started sharing Christmas music here, years ago, it was because people kept writing at their blogs about how much they hated Christmas music. I felt then, and still feel, that they  were thinking of “Frosty the Snowman” played eleventy jillion times on Muzak at their workplaces or at the mall. But Christmas music includes so many other things that you can enjoy some different Christmas music every single day of advent and never hear the same thing twice.

So today when people say that they’re sick of Christmas music, you can suggest the “Hallelujah Chorus.” That link is from 1916, and maybe not the loveliest, but I know that I have at least one reader who can’t see YouTube, which is the place to go for Messiah online. You can watch the funny one with nuns there, even.

And if you don’t like Messiah, you can easily find a recording of “Frosty the Snowman.”