Updates!

This year we rocked Community United Methodist Church more than ever, again lifting up rousing renditions of Christmas favourites, many of which were own original arrangements! Our full on rock band featured two soaring electric guitars, a chucking acoustic guitar, a heavy hitting drum set and a driving percussionist with myself on the thumping bassline and the lead vocals. If you didn’t think Rock and Roll could make you feel God’s awesome prescence, think again!

Our concert started off with our enthusiastic arrangement of “O Come, All Ye Faithful”, followed by a rockin’ arrangement of “Angels We Have Heard On High” by the group, MercyMe. We slowed it down a bit for Dave’s arrangement of “What Child Is This, a pensive, 6/8 rocker where I pulled out my extra bassy 5-string guitar and Dan launched into a flying guitar solo. We let the band take a break while Dave took to the piano and I belted out the prayerful “O Holy Night.” And we capped off the set with a finger-snapping, toe-taping jazzy version of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman” with a groovy walking bassline.

We humbly and gratefully accepted your generous offering while Dave regaled us with a piano solo, a medley of the Vince Guaraldi’s “Christmas Time Is Here,” followed by his own snappy version of “Infant Holy, Infant Lowly” and the rest of the band came downstage and set up for our acoustic set!

Acoustic Set

Our Acoustic set gave our percussionists a chance to have fun on an array of multi-cultural instruments. During “We Three Kings,” Greg kept time on the tambourine while Marc played the cajon, a latin percussion instrument, and Dan plays a beautifully executed guitar solo.

The next song is one of my personal favourites in our show, “O Come, Emmanuel” that I arranged into a bossa style during which Dave delivered an equisite solo on the acoustic guitar and Greg played the guiro, a very cool latin percussion instrument. The Latin flair continued with “Mary, Did You Know” which again featured Marc on the cajon and a lyrical guitar solo by Dan.

This year we had the extra blessing of directing music for our annual church Christmas Pageant. The music was so good that I had to invite our ‘student orchestra’ to give an encore performance!! Shaan, Greg and Jeff joined our band for two outstanding songs, “I Wonder As I Wander” and Dave’s pulse quickening arrangement of “The Carol of the Bells!”

Part 2

The second half of our show started with our dreamy ballad version of “Joy To The World” with Dave solo on the acoustic guitar playing some very lovely chords.

The band reconvened to deliver a sock-hop style medley of Rockin’ Christmas tunes that got some adventurous audience members up on their feet, clapping and dancing in the aisles! Marc shared the lead singing with me here and we alternated vocals on “Jingle Bell Rock,” “Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree,” “Blue Christmas” and “I’ll Be Home For Christmas” and he stepped out into an awesome wipe-out style drum solo!

We then settled down into a 4/4 pop ballad version of “Silent Night” featuring Seth on a bluesy acoustic guitar solo. Greg then brought us all together and led us in a heartfelt prayer, thanking God for our friends and family and asking for togetherness and rememberance. We followed up with our arrangement of “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” as a swaying r&b ballad.

Everybody got up on their feet one last time for our lively pop rock version of “Hark The Herald Angels Sing” giving Dave a chance to pull out a rockin electric guitar solo and while the audience clapped along.

We can’t thank everyone enough for having such a good time with us, supporting our church community and most importantly Praising God and giving Him Glory for giving us the gift of His Son! Our heartfelt thanks, appreciation and love go out to all. We can’t wait to do it again in 2010!

Cast

• Chrissy Almeida – Vocals and Bass Guitar
• Dave Shrewsbury – Piano, Acoustic and Electric Guitar
• Dan Milone – Electric Guitar
• Seth Kellogg – Acoustic Guitar
• Marc Sherman – Drums, Percussion and Vocals
• Greg Pehrson – Percussion
• Andrew Martin – Sound
• Showtime Sound and Lighting – Lights
• Michael and Barbara Raphael – Video
• AJ Vallario – Video

Song list:
Part 1

• O Come, All Ye Faithful
• Gloria (Angels We Have Heard On High)
• What Child Is This
• O Holy Night
• God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
• Dave’s Solo during the Offering

- Acoutic Set -

• We Three Kings
• O Come, Emmanuel
• Mary, Did You Know
• I Wonder As I Wander
• Carol of the Bells

Part 2

• Joy To The World

- Rock Medley -

• Jingle Bell Rock, Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree, Blue Christmas, I’ll Be Home For Christmas
• Silent Night
• Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
• Hark The Herald Angels Sing