ON the Beat | ‘Tis the Season to be Choral

Quire of Voyces at SBMA | Credit: Josef Woodard

You may know or have heard rumor about the alleged richness of choral music resources in Santa Barbara. We get periodic reminders throughout the year, as various established choral groups concertize separately, or can be heard in conglomerated choral corralling as witnessed in the Santa Barbara Symphony’s Brahms and Mozart requiems this year.

But the true compacted harvest of choral music comes to town in the Christmas season. It’s a sturdy December tradition, globally and locally, starting with a friendly flood of options this weekend. Here’s a ripe chance to go on a choral hopping adventure and to see and hear what the community has to offer.

The action begins, in appetizer form, when the Nathan Kreitzer–founded and directed a cappella ensemble Quire of Voyces gives a short performance at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art tonight, December 4th, as part of the First Thursday celebration. This will also be a de facto preview of the much-cherished, 32-year-old group’s annual Mysteries of Christmas concert, settling into the old worldly ambience of St. Anthony’s chapel on December 13 and 14.

Westmont’s Christmas Festival tradition, now 21 years in the running, graduated into the big house space of The Granada Theatre a few years ago, and that trend continues with shows this weekend, December 6 and 7. It’s a showcase moment for the college’s choral and orchestral forces, along with narrative and other festive trimmings along the musical path.

Another a cappella mainstay on the local choral front is the Aldelfos Ensemble, which has its holiday concert, entitled “Hodie Christus Natus Est!,” this Saturday afternoon, also in the spacious splendor of St. Anthony’s Chapel. In focus is eminent renaissance composer Pierluigi da Palestrina, celebrating his 500th birthday this year.

In a way, the big choral news in town this Christmas is a change-up for two seasoned and potent choral groups, the Santa Barbara Choral Society and the S.B. Master Chorale. The Choral Society has long presented the variety show known as the Hallelujah Project at the Lobero, a program which reached across various aisles of serious and light music listenership and ages — including celebrity readings of A Christmas Carol and audience with St. Nick in the house. This year, the Choral Society scales down to a concert dubbed An American Holiday, at Trinity Lutheran Church on Sunday, December 14. Featured on the menu is the world premiere of the piece Winter’s Window, by Hollywood composer Julia Marie Newmann. She is married to — and sometimes a creative collaborator with — composer Cody Westheimer, who premiered the Chumash-oriented orchestral work Wisdom of the Water, Earth, Sky with the Santa Barbara Symphony in 2023.

Meanwhile, the Lobero’s choral Christmas factor is filled in with the Master Chorale’s first performance in this lofty space in many years, bringing the program The Light So Shines on Friday, December 12. Now directed by David Lozano Torres, the Master Chorale aims to present a theatrical event with choral music, aided by a chamber orchestra, that blends in with dramatic touches and harmony-fortified caroling. On the menu are Gerald Finzi’s In Terra Pax, and music from living composers Sarah Quartel, Mack Wilber, and Mark Hayes, among other music left of standard fare.

For anyone longing for more sacred and serious musical fare, proceed directly to the time-honored Messiah Singalong 2025, led by veteran conductor Phillip McLendon at the First Presbyterian Church on Tuesday, December 16. Bring your own scores and courage/will to sing. Proceeds benefit Unity Shoppe, a better cause than ever in these lean, Trumped-down times.

Julia Marie Newman (center), Kevin Su Fukagawa, and JoAnne Wasserman of the S.B. Choral Society | Credit: Courtesy

From elsewhere on the planetary palette, check out Sounds and Stories of Greek Christmas at the Santa Barbara Greek Orthodox Church on Saturday, December 13 at 3 p.m.. A special musical guest is locally raised, internationally established opera singer Xeni Tziouvaras, who went to Dos Pueblos High School before attending Manhattan School of Music and basing her global career from her present home base of Florence.

The Christmas Revels perform “Five Gold Rings” | Photo: Courtesy

On the more secular front — Christmas sans the “Christ” part — choral sonics are also a critical element of the Christmas Revels tradition, landing at the Lobero on December 20 and 21. This year’s theme: The Celestial Fools, a Magical Winter’s Tale.

Beyond choral matters, this year’s Christmas music parade also includes some significant artists on holiday show duty. Ukulele master and friendly iconoclastic Jake Shimabukuro makes one of his regular visits to town, with holiday manners in tow via his Holidays in Hawai‘i program at the Arlington Theatre on Wednesday, December 10. The show represents the annual tip of the programming nog from UCSB Arts & Lectures. Local musical hero Tina Schlieske brings her holiday show — a hit in her old hometown of Minneapolis — to the Lobero Theatre on Thursday, December 11 (see story here).

Another annual Yuletide tradition, from the pop and folk-rock camp, comes with the arrival of the venerable brotherly band Venice, bringing its savory harmonies to SOhO, on Sunday, December 14. Call this one choral music, pocket pop division.

Blues in Many Shades and Grooves

Vanessa Collier, Santa Barbara Blues Society 2025 | Photo: Josef Woodard

Over its 48-year history, the Santa Barbara Blues Society (SBBS) has done more than its fair share of keeping the torch for the central b-word in question. Plenty of blues veterans and real deal blues have passed through SBBS’s various portals — the latest of which is the winsome Carrillo Recreation Center. But there are plenty of blues derivatives and byproducts in the mix, as well, a point hammered home through the recent show from powerhouse blues/R&B singer-saxophonist Vanessa Collier.

Other engagements that night kept me from seeing more than just the last handful of tunes. But even in that compact dosage, the diversity of the music spoke to the expansive palette of things bluesy, in her world and in the music world. Abetted by a solid band, the buffy-voiced Collier seamlessly shifted gears and changed idiomatic costumes from the simmering sensual pulse of “Love Me Like a Man” to her swampy original “When it Don’t Come Easy,” and from her James Brown–like funk tune, “Tongue Tied” to the New Orleans–fired encore of “Bad News Bears.” To end the night in a controlled frenzy, the band kicked into double time and got the venue’s famed spring-loaded dance floor a run for its money.

To-Doings:

Longtime Santa Barbaran jazz pianist, vocalist, and educator Debbie Denke took some extra-musical time off recently, going through heart surgery from which she continues to recover. In what is a fitting location, there will be a self-described “fun/fund raiser” event for her recovery and expenses lands on Wednesday, December 10, at 7 p.m. in the soon-to-be officially opened Grand on State (a hop from The Granada Theatre, at 1218 State).

The new jazz club/eatery (with a Mediterranean leaning) is being launched soon by keyboardist extraordinaire Brian Mann and his wife Jenna Berg, and the “grand” in question is a choice Steinway B model, assuming a prominent perch in a space pregnant with promise for upping the jazz content on the local scene. Various musicians will be on hand to perform for Denke’s fund-raising wingding, a potluck and BYO-whatever affair, given the pre-opening status of the room.

The guest of honor will have to wait her turn to take the wheel of the Grand. A Gofundme campaign is also underway, link.

In non-holiday music news, SOhO’s slate this week features jazz moments courtesy of Kim Collins’ Jazz Combo Workshop on Sunday afternoon, and the fusion-ECM-ish and self-described “Euro-Brazil progressive jazz” focus of the group known as M.O.B. In the ranks are keyboardist Bruce Bigheno, vocalist Eje Lynn-Jacobs, violinist Gunnar Juergens, drummer Shaun Oster, and bassist Sam McKinney.