Swinging Into Christmas 1942
COSHOCTON – The Coshocton Junior High Band, Coshocton High School concert band, Jazz Reservation, Coshocton City Schools Elementary Choir, Chamber Singers, Men’s Ensemble and Festival Choir presented various well known selections including the iconic “Let It Snow,” “Here Comes Santa Claus,” “Boogie Woogie Santa Claus,” “Silver Bells,” and others during the “Swinging Into Christmas 1942” Christmas concert presented on Tuesday evening, Dec. 16 in the high school auditorium. Adding to the authenticity of the presentation was snow falling on the singers – that combined with the 1940s era costumes made it feel like a true old fashioned Christmas. The year 1942 was the year that Irving Berlin introduced “White Christmas” a song that quickly became a wartime favorite. According to the Guinness World Records, the version sung by Bing Crosby is the best-selling single of all time with sales in excess of 50 million copies worldwide.
Artistic directors for the program were: Michael Blowers, Richard Early, Shannon Folkert, Barry Hardesty and Aaron Mencer.
The Coshocton Schools choirs plan to take a trip to South Carolina’s Patriot Point this spring to perform on a World War II era ship. The trip is called The Patriotic Salute to the Greatest Generation and money is needed to fund the trip. For $10 you can sponsor an In Honor Of or an In Memory Of name on a board that will travel with the choir. For more information you can contact Teresa Ott at the school.
Anna Richcreek, who sang “All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth,” said, “It was really fun. I was a little bit nervous but I kind of got over it. I have done it a lot with the Footlight Players.” Anna is the 11-year-old daughter of Jeff and Angela Richcreek and is a sixth grader at Sacred Heart Elementary. “When I grow up I want to be a professional ballerina. That’s my passion but I also want to act and sing. I don’t want to drop down on something; I want to keep it up.”
“I enjoyed being in the program. I go to a different school, I go to Sacred Heart and so I wasn’t part of Coshocton Elementary but meeting new friends and being with different types of people really helped me gain a new life skill I think. I think it helped loosen my nerves.”
Then we had to talk about the “elf” pajamas that Anna wore. “My mom got these for me. Last year she got a pair like this and that was fun. For my sister she got a Santa one. For Christmas we have cousins coming over from California and Virginia and we thought they would really like it because they are young. We like them a lot so this year we thought we would get another pair just in a bigger size so we could use them for this Christmas program and also wearing them as pajamas.”
mark@coshoctoncountybeacon.com
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