Hear holiday classics Messiah and Nutcracker
On the heels of holiday POPS performances of the Home Alone,film score live, Messiah and Nutcracker performances offer traditional holiday classics.
Messiah
For the second consecutive season, the NJSO performs Handel's Messiah at the Richardson Auditorium in Princeton and NJPAC in Newark. The December 18 Princeton performance is already sold out; seats remain available for the December 20 matinee in Newark.
The Star-Ledger hailed last season's performances as ones "worth the wait":
While many renditions now use period instruments, this one maintained a streamlined, polished quality that respected tradition while offering glowing tones that projected easily in the intimate hall. Adding to the sense of authenticity was the accompaniment of recitative and arias on a mix of harpsichord and organ. A quartet of youthful soloists with slender voices fit snugly into the arrangement.
Handel’s 1742 work chronicles the birth of Christ, the crucifixion and the resurrection through text by Charles Jennens based on Old and New Testament material. What sets it apart from so many holiday entertainments is that beyond its messages of mercy, faith and peace, it is exquisitely crafted, drawing on the full range of Handel’s experience as the leading operatic composer of his day.
The work encompasses not just the telling of events in a story, but also emotional reaction to and reflection on events, and it employs vivid text painting throughout.
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Lacombe’s conducting was sure-handed throughout, notable for its fluid, shapely phrasing, its crisp articulation and its gradual build to a satisfying conclusion. The NJSO played with lithe, pliant sound.
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Together, orchestra, chorus, conductor and soloists brought out the work’s many shades, and delivered that one particular seasonal requirement, a rousing “Hallelujah.”
Learn more and purchase tickets to the NJPAC performance.
Nutcracker
When the curtain rises on New Jersey Ballet’s sensational Nutcracker at the Mayo Performing Arts Center in Morristown, audiences can expect a performance critics have called “A spectacle that never seems to age…magic that should go on and on.” The NJSO collaborates with the ballet company and the Morristown concert hall for 14 performances of the holiday classic, beginning this Friday, December 11. When it announced the new collaboration, The Star-Ledger wrote that the “New Jersey rendition of ‘The Nutcracker’ is already shaping up to be something special.”
Learn more about the Nutcracker performances and purchase tickets.