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The Wichita campus has fulfilled the dreams of cruise travelers globally since 1997.

Our employees are passionate, enthusiastic and committed to providing outstanding customer service.

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Information at 3166812688.

KPTS presents the Wichita Chamber Chorale.

[singing] My goals for the choir are in some ways rather simple, and I think I can get it into one word.

I'm going to use a Latin word, and that's Meli Ora, which means ever better.

I think all of us want to get better at everything that we do.

But as an artistic director and a conductor, that's really the essence of what I'm thinking about.

[singing] I know.

When I left Wichita 15 years ago, after conducting the first 25 years, I didn't know for sure what would become of it.

And nobody wants to put it in the kind of time and effort that I did, just to see a group fold.

When we moved to Wichita, I took a couple of years off, but then I needed to find a group that I could be in consistently that met the need in my soul to sing music.

And I Googled one day and found the Wichita Chamber Chorale and listened to some of their previous things that are on the website and read about all the singers and everyone who's involved and made some connections and it was a joy to come and audition and to get involved in that very first concert I was on.

We sang things that I had sung previously, and so it was an immediate connection.

To be able to be involved in something at the exact level is what I had once been involved in.

We'll all play your tambourine, Robin with your flute.

Begin play your pipe and play your drum to do Ludo Do Pata Pata Pan Play your pipe and play your drum sing Noel to all kinds of ancient days he sings in praise of the King of kings.

When you hear the pipe and drum to the little lulu Pata Pata pone When you hear the pipe and drum you will know that the Saviours come.

[Singing] Dance and sing lead with joy at the birth of the infant Boy.

Dance with a pipe and dance with drum to dance with pipe and dance with drum [singing] When the concert happens and everything has come together, that's really satisfying and actually that parallels the most satisfying thing as a singer.

You know, the rehearsals are done, the rhythms are all learned, the notes are all learned, and you're just more in the moment during the performance.

I think that's the experience of most singers that I know.

It's Showtime and I really enjoy looking out at the audience and seeing everybody and their faces and just kind of wondering what they're getting out of the performance.

And then usually at least once a concert, there's a moment where I get the chills, whether it's a certain chord or a memory that crosses my mind.

And I just love that feeling.

I think anyone that's ever been in a really good choir, like the Wichita Chamber Chorale, you just know that feeling and you wish you could bottle it.

[Singing] I was in graduate school in the mid-seventies, anxious to return to Wichita, and I realized that there was likely no community level group that could sing the kind of music I had been exposed to.

And as I just thought of the names of singers in town, I felt like an auditioned ensemble might appeal to them.

We contacted a lot of those singers and pulled together an audition rehearsal.

As I think about our concerts, the one that stands out probably the most to me is in my church at First United Methodist Church, where we brought in an orchestra, and the music was very challenging.

The energy was high, the audience was was great.

[Singing] I remember as a performer in band.

I was a trombone player in high school when I heard quality groups.

It inspired me to be a better musician.

And I think that that's an important part of of our mission is inspiring young people to to do beautiful music.

And we have programing such as our educational programing, which we do with choirs in the area.

We do partnership concerts, bringing a variety of choirs onto the stage with us.

And that, of course, brings in their families and people that want to hear them.

And we also do specific school related programs such as the Hartland Choral Festival, helping students learn their audition music for District nine state choir auditions.

We also have specific programs such as the Kansas Choral Composition Prize, which is was invented by the Wichita Chamber Chorale to promote choral composition, new choral composition by composers from, the state of Kansas.

So that's a great sort of specific example of a very unique contribution that's targeted to our our mission as a choir and is related directly to our home state.

[Singing] Henry Van Dyke was a remarkable man who loved Christmas time.

He was a professor at Princeton.

He was the pastor who was asked to officiate at Mark Twain's funeral.

He wrote the lyrics to the hymn Joyful, Joyful We Adore Thee.

I think most of us know who wrote the music for that one.

And he was also a prolific writer.

He wrote the Christmas classic The Story of the Other Wise Man.

He was also an accomplished poet.

And our final poem tonight was written by Henry Van Dyke in 1912.

It's called Christmas Tears.

The Day Returns by Which We Date Our Year's Day of the Joy of Giving.

That means love day of the joy of living, that means hope, day of the Royal Child and day that brings to older hearts the gift of Christmas tears.

Look how the candles twinkle through the tree The children shout When baby claps his hands The room is full of laughter and of song Your lips are smiling, dearest, tell me why your eyes are brimming full of Christmas tears.

Was it a silent voice that joined the song A Vanished Face that glimmered once again among the happy circle around the tree?

Was it an unseen hand that touched your cheek and brought the secret gift of Christmas tears not dark and angry like the winter storm of selfish grief but full of starry gleams and soft and still that others may not weep Dos have remembered happiness to send to bless us with the gift of Christmas tears I'll lose them not dear hearts Life has no pearls More pure than memories of joy, love shared See while we count them one by one with prayer The heavenly hope that lights the Christmas tree has made a rainbow in our Christmas tears.

There have been a number of times while making music with this group that I just became emotional, realizing that it has succeeded now for over 40 years.

Well, as I look ahead for the Wichita Chamber Chorale again, I'm thinking about excellence and relevance in tandem.

So the idea of being relevant means we needed to look at different populations, different cultural groups, different religious affiliations, different demographics, different issues, different social issues.

Perhaps our recent concert with Family Promise was a great example of tapping into not only a different constituency, but also because of their work with situational homelessness.

It was a way of actually tapping into a social issue and bringing music to bear on on that particular topic, we have to recognize that that essential sort of human aspect, it's the one it's the one instrument that belongs to all of us.

And whether people know it or not, when you listen to acquire, perform, there is a certain sympathetic or empathetic vibe that an audience member will get and will sense, whether they are actually singers or not.

[Singing] In this program.

My favorite piece is the Missa Carolae and part of the reason why I like this piece is that I feel in this day and age, meaning the old with the new is something that's very important.

We, we retell stories in our generation's stories that go back to ancient times.

And this song or this work actually within the concert is ancient text.

Text that is very familiar to many people, but then it's also paired with very familiar tunes for the holiday season.

And I find it very interesting to protect it with a familiar tune that don't normally go together, in particular the Agnus Dei text that is represented in this song is set with the tune of infant lowly, infant holy.

And in the Latin, you're saying Agnus Dei, LAMB of God, take away the sin of the world.

LAMB of God bring us peace.

And then if you remember the words of infant, lowly infant holy, it's the words of Christ, the baby's born for all.

And the putting those two together is a very emotional, especially at this time of year when you're thinking about peace and harmony and why can't the world just get along and that somewhere in the piece of music you can bring it all together.

[Singing] [Applause] Celebrity Cruises Wichita Campus is led by a dedicated and experienced management team.

The Wichita campus has fulfilled the dreams of cruise travelers globally since 1997.

Our employees are passionate, enthusiastic and committed to providing outstanding customer service.

Love my nurse.

Home Health Providing in-home services for homebound seniors, Medicare Certified and locally owned.

I love my nurse AECOM Art Jimenez family dentistry serving all ages with dental services, including orthodontics information at 3166812688.