WMRA Holiday Broadcast Schedule 2004 Winter Solstice Celebration, this year with a decidedly Russian flavor: The Dmitri Pokrovsky Ensemble-Russian village dancers Tuesday, Dec. 7th and singers-- joins African mbira master Chris Berry and the famous Paul Winter Consort. They'll lead our "Journey Through 7pm A Taste of Chanukah the Longest Night" with new works and old favorites including "Dancing Day," the West African "Minuit" and Paul Winter's This celebration of Chanukah features over 150 musicians from "Icarus." Wolves, whales and the audience in New York's the New England Conservatory, the Boston Community Choir Cathedral of St. John the Divine join in with holiday glee. 2 and other ensembles. The show is recorded live at the New hours. England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall in Boston. 1 hour. 10pm The Christmas Revels: A Celebration of the Winter Solstice Wednesday, Dec. 8th The Christmas Revels: A Celebration of the Winter Solstice 2004 7pm Chanukah in Story and Song is an all-new compilation of carols, rounds, drinking songs, music-hall numbers, madrigals and motets, children's singing A Chanukah celebration featuring The Western Wind and games, wassails, and traditional, social, and ritual dance tunes, narrated by Leonard Nimoy. They will present many eclectic selected from the nine live Christmas Revels performances that selections, from the Ladino songs of the Spanish Jews and took place around the country last year. 2 hours. Yiddish melodies of Eastern Europe to modern Israeli tunes. 1 hour. st Tuesday, Dec. 21

Thursday, Dec. 9th 7pm Christmas at El Pardo

7pm Chanukah Lights Christmas at El Pardo presents a magnificent hour-long concert of Father Antonio Soler's Christmas villancicos (songs) with brief A collection of readings that explore Chanukah traditions in interludes of plain chant. The concert is performed by the Lyra original stories. Hosted by Murray Horwitz and Susan Stamberg. Baroque Orchestra and Spain's El Escorial Boychoir and Monastic 1 hour. Choir. Composer Antonio Soler created this set of villancicos while serving as court composer to King Ferdinand VI of Spain in the 18th century. This concert is the first modern-day Sunday, Dec. 19th presentation of these works, featuring both a period-instrument orchestra and the actual choir for which Soler composed the 8pm A Paul Winter’s Solstice Concert pieces. The performance took place at El Pardo, an extraordinary 15th-century hunting palace just outside Madrid. The long dark night, the promise of lighter days ahead -- the The concert was recorded live by Spanish state radio before a Winter Solstice stirs our most primal emotions. It's a story that capacity crowd in the great hall at El Pardo. 1 hour. Paul Winter tells each year with traditions new and old, from around the world. John Schaefer hosts Paul Winter's annual classic, live from the stunning acoustics of the new Walt Disney WMRA Holiday Broadcast Schedule 2004 Concert Hall in Los Angeles. 3 hours.

th Wednesday, Dec. 22nd Friday, Dec 24

9am Echoes of Christmas (Dale Warland Singers) 7pm A Candlelight Christmas The Dale Warland Singers, in their final Echoes of Christmas This program features the Heinz Chapel Choir Recorded in the concert recorded in December 2003, featuring popular carols in beautiful and historic Heinz Chapel at the University of new arrangements, and new music for the season. 1 hour. Pittsburgh. Hear a showcase of holiday choral favorites spanning many centuries and continents. The repertoire includes O Come, 10am A Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols – Live O Come Emmanuel, In the Bleak Midwinter; and popular carols like The Christmas Song, as well as ethnic holiday music from The sound of one pure, solitary child's voice rings out each Brazil. 1 hour. Christmas Eve at the Chapel of King's College in Cambridge. The Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols weaves lessons among great 8pm Carols For Christmas choral anthems. 1-1/2 hours.

This show comes from the nation's capital, and features a 12pm Holiday Pops – festival of superb choirs joined by some of the finest young Keith Lockhardt and the Boston Pops soloists in the land. Listeners will enjoy traditional favorites, such as "Joy to the World" and "Adeste Fideles." They also hear Hear one of the world's most famous orchestras performing soloists performing "Cantique d'noel" (O, Holy Night), excerpts music for the holidays under the leadership of charismatic from Berlioz popular "Enfance du Chris," long-standing favorite conductor Keith Lockhardt. 2 hours. "Ave Maria" by Gounod, festive works by Verdi and Puccini, and a hallelujah chorus. Readings are interspersed among the carols 2pm A Chanticleer Christmas to retell the Christmas story. 1 hour. The twelve men of Chanticleer, one of America's premiere vocal ensembles, have been called "an orchestra of voices." This Thursday, Dec. 23rd special Chanticleer performance was recorded at the St. Vincent Church in Petaluma, California, and showcases the group's 7pm Handel’s Messiah from Disney Hall Grammy Award-winning style in everything from renaissance Christmas hymns to Music Director Joseph Jennings' own close- NPR and CBC/Radio Canada join forces for an international harmony arrangements of holiday classics. 1 hour. broadcast of Handel's masterpiece, featuring an American orchestra with a Canadian conductor and choir. Quebec City 3pm Christmas with the Philadelphia Singers conductor Bernard Labadie leads the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the singers of his hometown Chapelle de Quebec, and four A concert of traditional and contemporary holiday music world-class soloists for an all-star performance of this holiday performed by the renowned choral group, The Philadelphia Singers, recorded live at St. Clemens Church. 1 hour. WMRA Holiday Broadcast Schedule 2004 th Sunday, Dec 26 Friday, Dec 24th 8pm A Christmas Celtic Sojourn 8pm A Holiday Folk Tour with Judy Collins Featuring the renowned, all-female, Irish traditional group Judy Collins hosts an all-new hour-long tour around the nation Cherish the Ladies, The Robbie O'Connell Band, and the featuring musical takes on the holiday season with artists exquisite vocal harmonies of Navan, A Christmas Celtic Sojourn including Trout Fishing in America, Steve Earle and Maria is a mix of Christmas songs, stories, dances, and poems McKee, Tish Hinojosa, Ian Anderson, Bill Miller, and the Blind carefully crafted by host Brian O'Donovan. It’s a charming hour Boys of Alabama with Tom Waits. 1 hour. of conviviality and good humor, peppered with thought- provoking reflections on the season and wonderful performances 9pm The Pleasures of Winter of traditional and contemporary Celtic music. 1 hour.

Jay Ungar & Molly Mason host this holiday celebration with 9pm A Seasons Griot: The Trickster music ranging from a unique selection of lively seasonal offerings to deeply moving pieces that reflect the more A Kwanzaa celebration that looks at one of the most ubiquitous thoughtful and reflective side of winter and the holiday season. characters in world mythology. The Trickster takes many forms, Interspersed are humorous, thought-provoking seasonal human and animal. Whether it's Anansi or Brer Rabbit, this readings. 1 hour. imaginative, clever character is always reminding the foolhardy to keep their eyes open and the watchful to stay alert. At the 10pm A Toss the Feathers Christmas same time, he urges folks by example not to take life too seriously. Beloved for the humor of his various pranks and This year finds A Toss the Feathers Christmas in its 11th season adventures, the Trickster is as much a feature of the African of enchanting music and holiday lovers alike. New to the mythic landscape as that of any other tradition. 1 hour. program are British folk-rock veterans Jethro Tull and Britain's hottest up-and-coming folk-rock phenom Jim Moray, winner of a 10pm The Christmas Stocking BBC Radio 2004 Folk Award for Album of the Year and The Horizon Award for best newcomer. 2 hours. How was Christmas celebrated in its earliest days? What are some of the wackiest Christmas traditions? How historically accurate is the story of Christmas? Get answers to those questions and more than you bargained for with this collection of stories, oddities, history, vignettes, readings, anecdotes, trivia and an eclectic selection of holiday music, featuring classical, folk, blues, pop, Cajun, country, rock 'n roll, soul and some items that just defy categorization! 2 hours.