The Baker University music department is preparing for the 80th annual Christmas Candlelight Vespers concert.
“This is only my second year, so I don’t have a long history of working with this concert,” Director of Choral Activities Matthew Potterton said. “I changed it up quite a bit last year, just because it was my first year and I want to add … to the concert.”
The Baker Concert Choir, Baker Chamber Choir, Baker Orchestra, Baker Faculty Brass Quintet, Baker Percussion Ensemble, Baker Speech Choir, the Saxophone Quartet and the University Community Choir will all perform at the concert.
“This is the one concert out of the year that we all come together and just do one concert,” Potterton said. “I thought it would be great to have as many voices from the campus as possible present on this concert so that the community can see what Baker has to offer.”
Members of the Baker Faculty Brass Quintet have started the event with Christmas carols for the past few years, and Assistant Professor of Music Ray James is a part of that group.
“We are basically just doing the opening music,” James said. “We will start out in the upper-story of the church. We’ll open up the windows … and play carols over the campus for 30 minutes before each concert starts.”
While this is Potterton’s second Vespers concert, he hopes it will be better than last year’s.
“This year my goal was to make it better than last year’s, and hopefully it will be,” Potterton said. “I just want it to keep getting better and better.”
One of the additions to this year’s concert that Potterton is most excited about is that the Baker University Speech Choir will be performing.
“I didn’t even know about them last year at Vespers time, but I’ve seen them several times now, and I thought it would be great to have them have some sort of part in this concert,” Potterton said. “I love that we have so many Baker participants … it’ll be a nice addition to the concert.”
The concert is at 4 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. Sunday at the First United Methodist Church in Baldwin City.
