Christmas is the time of year for spreading joy, giving thanks and generally being merry and jolly. One way of spreading joy while being merry and jolly is to sing your heart out with a group of others doing the same thing.
And thanks to United Baptist Church, there’s a venue for you to do just that.
The church invites anyone who wants to sing classic Christmas songs with a group of others to come down for the second annual Christmas Carol Sing Along on Sunday at 4 p.m. The whole shebang will take place at the church, 39 Fayette St., and it will feature all the old-school Christmas tunes.
“Kind of like your grampa did, because it’s congregational singing,” said Dave Denis, pastor at United Baptist Church.
To explain that a little more, he added, “It’s a church, so we won’t do Santa this or Jingle that – it will be traditional Christmas carols.”
So in other words, expect to sing “Silent Night” and “Joy to the World,” not “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer” or “Dominick the Donkey.” Sorry, kiddos (and adults who love those songs).
The reason for this is not to limit the fun and appeal, Denis said. Rather, it’s to provide a place for people who grew up singing traditional carols in church to revisit that era and remember what it was like.
“There are a lot of people who would like to have that experience,” he said. “They want to touch base with that again, and they’re welcome. Everybody’s welcome.”
Although the event takes place at a church and involves singing songs about Jesus and Mary, there will not be any religious service performed – “Just everyone singing,” Denis said.
“Nobody’s going to preach. The whole purpose is to get together and sing.”
Last year was the first year the church put on the sing-along, and Denis said it went pretty well “considering I did a lousy job promoting it.” He said that despite not really getting the word out effectively, there were still about 30 to 40 people who turned out to sing. It wasn’t exactly the youngest crowd, though, and Denis said he’d love to see more families with young kids show up this year.
“Our church kind of skews to the over-50 crowd,” he said. “So we had some folks from our church, some other folks who heard about it. The sanctuary will hold about 120 people, so it wasn’t packed.”
But he can’t stress enough that he would be delighted to see a full house come Sunday afternoon.
“The more the merrier, because you get more voices and it’s more fun,” Denis said.
You don’t have to be a member of the church to participate in the sing along – you don’t even need to be particularly religious at all, as the church’s website declares, “You don’t have to believe it to sing it.”
And if you’re not a classically trained musician with years of experience harmonizing, don’t worry too much about that, either.
“It’s totally open to everyone, all ages,” Denis said. “You don’t even have to sing well. I don’t care if you sing on pitch or off.”
Denis said he has noticed a trend in today’s youth toward doing everything online and not actually going out and experiencing the real world. He hopes that the sing along will help some kids realize that it can be a lot of fun to actually get out of the house and meet new people to share an experience with.
“I’m in my early 50s, and when we were growing up we would actually sing Christmas carols in school,” Denis said. “Kids knew these Christmas carols – ‘Hark the Herald Angels Sing,’ ‘Come O Ye Faithful,’ ‘Joy to the World’ – my sense is that a lot of kids these days don’t really know these songs.”
So does that mean that it’s all doom and gloom for the future? That classic Christmas carols will die with this generation? That future Christmases will be celebrated entirely online?
Hardly.
“I think a lot of parents grew up with these songs and want their kids to experience them,” Denis said. “Let’s experience it together instead of watching on YouTube. Experience what it’s like to sing with a bunch of other people.”
If you’re still not convinced, we’ll leave you with this kicker: There’s a good chance there will be some refreshments, so. . . .