Nowell Sing We Clear has toured for more than three decades, with its unusual songs, carols, stories, and customs. Drawn mostly from English-language folk traditions, the songs tell both a version of the events and characters involved in the Christmas story and detail the customs which make up the twelve magical days following the return of the light at the winter solstice. Many of these ancient customs are the basis of the today's holiday traditions, such as visiting and feasting, gift-giving, carol singing from door-to-door and the adorning of houses and churches with garlands of evergreen. Nowell Sing We Clear celebrates Christmas as it was known for centuries in Britain and North America and as it continues in many places to the present. The songs come from an age when the midwinter season was a time for joyous celebration and vigorous expression of older, perhaps pagan, religious ideas. There is not always a clear line between these and the rejoicing at the birth of Jesus bringing a fresh light into the world at this dark midwinter time. A special and unusual treat is the enactment of a Mummers Play from Kentucky. Performed in the traditional manner, the play is typical of folk dramas which survive to this day throughout Britain and North America symbolizing and portraying the death of the land at midwinter and its subsequent rebirth in the spring. While much of the singing is done in unaccompanied style, the pageant is also stamped with the energetic dance band sound of fiddle, button accordion, electric piano, drums, and concertina. The audience will be supplied with songsheets and encouraged to sing along. Some "new", that is "different", songs and carols are introduced every year. Performers are John Roberts and Tony Barrand, widely known for their lively presentations of English folk songs, and Fred Breunig and Andy Davis, well known in New England as dance callers and musicians.Advance Tickets! Advance Tickets! Advance Tickets!The Theater is intimate, and we are offering Advance Tickets.
FSGW Members: $22, Nonmenbers $25.
To order tickets send a check (payable to FSGW Tickets) to:Nowell Sing We Clear Tickets, c/o J.Woods
8401 Cedar St.,
Silver Spring, MD 20910Please list the names of ALL FSGW members you are ordering tickets for.
Questions on tickets: contact Jennifer Woods at 301-587-7174 or knitpick@mac.com.
Ticket orders received after November 25th will be held at the door. Please include an email address orphone number. Check this FSGW webpage for ticket availability. It will be kept updated.Current status: As of Saturday afternoon before the concert, a couple of dozen tickets are still available.
