Celebrating the Holiday Season in Song

Marco Presbyterian Church will kick off the festive post-Thanksgiving glide to Christmas Day with a series of weekly musical events, one of them a community sing-along featuring the holiday season’s favorite carols. 

Entitled “A Season for Music,” the festivities kick-off at 6:00 PM on November 28, 2021 in the worship center with the “’Tis the Season for Bluegrass” concert featuring Zach and Maggie White and Matt Papa, Marco Presbyterian’s artist-in-residence. Folk and Americana are the specialty of the Nashville based duo. 

On December 12, the worship center will host a concert entitled “Let It Swing: A Jazz Christmas.” The 6:00 PM event will feature Atlanta based jazz pianist Will Fulkerson and Papa. 

Both Zach and Maggie White, and Fulkerson are friends of Papa, a world renowned contemporary Christian singer, song-and-hymn writer, and recording artist. The concerts are free to the public, although a love offering will be taken during the shows.

The two concerts bookend an event that proved popular last year, “Carols in the Courtyard” led by Marv Hollenbeck, the church’s former long-time choir director. The fun begins at 6:00 PM.

“Bring your own beach chair. We’ll provide cookies, coffee and hot chocolate, and then we sing our favorite Christmas carols and tunes,” said Jean Rowles, the church’s Director of Missions and its 9:00 AM service worship leader. “Marv is definitely a real showman and he did a great job with the sing-along last year. We had a great time.”

She hopes “A Season for Music” can become a permanent fixture on the Marco Presbyterian calendar. The event has its roots in a conversation she was having with Papa about planning the church’s annual Advent Series (Advent is the season of spiritual preparation before observing the birth of Christ, which runs from November 28 to December 24 this year).

“Part of it is because of Matt and all the different artists he has connections with,” explained Rowles. “Matt wrote a song called, “Sing Me the Songs of Emmanuel” and I said, ‘We should build the series around music since he’s here.’ Matt suggested, ‘Hey, I can bring some friends down and do some Christmas shows!’ So, it started with the Advent series and just snowballed.”

“After the last year’s tragedy, difficulties and the all-facets-of-life-altering upheaval of the pandemic, being able to observe a traditional Christmas holiday season will provide comfort,” she said. “Music is a key element in the recipe that makes it a treasured time,” added Rowles. 

“There is something about music that touches people in a way that the spoken word might not and I think, with holiday music or bluegrass music, there’s that hint of nostalgia, of good things that they bring to mind. There’s just so much joy in remembering what Christmas is all about, not just the fact that Jesus came, but you have all those family feelings and memories involved in the holiday. So, I think to be able to wrap all of that memory and feeling into a setting where not only are you listening to wonderful music, but after being apart for so long, to actually be together in a group, just adds another layer on top of all of those good feelings.”

Marco Presbyterian Church is located at 875 West Elkcam Circle. For more information, visit marcochurch.com or call 239-394-8186.