The UW-Platteville Department of Performing and Visual Arts held its 28th annual Holiday Gala, a two-night concert featuring performing groups of both vocal and instrumental, as well as community groups like the Platteville Children’s Choir.
In lieu of each ensemble having its own holiday concert, the Holiday Gala entails a few selections of music from multiple different ensembles. Instrumentalists and vocalists alike performed festive songs over two nights. Some groups, like the Flute Choir and the Piano Ensemble, perform even before the concert begins in the entryway or in the pit, over twelve groups performed, including smaller quartets and quintets between larger ensembles.
What makes the Holiday Gala so unique is the ability to explore different genres of Christmas music all in one concert. Each ensemble is able to perform something unique to them. For example, Jazz 1’s performance of “Selections of the Nutcracker Suite” contained familiar melodies remixed into a jazz style that no group could recreate. The Chamber Quintet and Piano Studio Ensemble performed music that embodied the cold winter months and the joy that it brings. Groups like the Low Brass Ensemble, Trumpet Ensemble and Saxophone Choir chose music that highlighted the skills of their unique instruments. The Chamber Choir performed “Christmas Time is Here,” famous from the Peanuts Christmas special, with some vocalists dressed like Peanuts characters.
The finale of both nights began with “Angels We Have Heard on High” which involved four choirs onstage at once, as well as the University Orchestra, and ended with “Sleigh Ride,” one of the most recognizable Christmas pieces for the band. Highlights of the Gala included festive concert attire, traditional Christmas sing-alongs with the audience and the assortment of music that put the audience and ensembles in the holiday spirit.
