News – September 15, 2009
Ticket Sales Commence for 2009 Edition of “The Pipes of Christmas”
Tickets are now on sale for the eleventh annual edition of “The Pipes of Christmas.” Two concerts are scheduled for 2PM and 8PM on Saturday, December 19 at Central Presbyterian Church located at 70 Maple Street in Summit, NJ. The “Pipes” will also return to New York City on Sunday, December 20 at the Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church, located at 921 Madison Avenue (at 73 Street). The Manhattan concert begins at 2:30 PM.
General admission tickets for the NJ concerts are $50. General admission tickets for the NYC performance are $60. Tickets for all performances are available via mail order. A downloadable ticket order form can be found on the concert’s website. Tickets for the NYC concert may also be purchased by mail and also online through SmartTix at www.smarttix.com or by phone at (212) 868-4444.
The concert presents the music of Christmas accompanied by a selection of readings taken from the Celtic literature of Scotland, Ireland, and Wales. Featured performers include Andrew Weir from the film “Braveheart,” the Scottish Country Dance trio Local Hero, the Solid Brass ensemble, Scottish harpist Jennifer Port, and the Kevin Ray Blandford Memorial Pipe Band of Redlands, CA.
About “The Pipes of Christmas”
Since making its debut in 1999, The Pipes of Christmas has played to standing room only audiences. Given the popularity of the program, a second concert was added in 2001 to accommodate the high-demand for tickets.
That same year, the concert began an award-winning partnership with HomeTowne Television by broadcasting concert highlights on Christmas Eve to an estimated 40,000 cable subscribers. Four productions have received the prestigious Telly Award for television production excellence.
Now a cherished holiday institution, the concert has provided audiences with a stirring and reverent celebration of the Christmas season and the Celtic spirit. Audience-goers return year after year to experience the program, many reporting that the Pipes of Christmas has become part of their family’s annual holiday traditions.
Since its debut in 1999, the concert has received great critical acclaim. In his review for Classical New Jersey Magazine, Paul Somers wrote, “The whole evening was constructed to introduce gem after gem and still have a finale which raised the roof. In short, it was like a well constructed fireworks show on the Glorious Fourth. The Westfield (NJ) Leader described the concert as “a unique sound of power and glory nowhere else to be found.”
Proceeds from the concert fund three annual music scholarships. The Alex Currie Memorial Scholarship for Bagpipe was created in honor of the famed Canadian piper and is administered by the Gaelic College in Nova Scotia. An additional piping scholarship – The Pipe Major Kevin Ray Blandford Scholarship – is awarded annually by the National Piping Centre in Glasgow, Scotland.
Scholarship winners – Peter Campbell (l) age 15 and brother Thomas Campbell (r) age 17 of Cape Elizabeth, Maine were the 2009 recipients of the Alex Currie Memorial Scholarship for Bagpipe at the Gaelic College in Nova Scotia, Canada.
The recently-announced Col. William McMurdo Currie Memorial Scholarship for the Clarsach (Scottish harp) will be awarded annually by the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama in Glasgow, Scotland. The scholarship honors the Glasgow-born founder of the Clan Currie Society, an international, non-profit – 501(c) 3 – cultural and educational organization.
The Society was formed in Glasgow, Scotland in 1959 to further the knowledge and appreciation of the MacMhuirich (pronounced MacVurich) bardic dynasty. The MacMhuirichs (the Gaelic name for Currie and derivative spellings including Curry, Currey, MacCurry, etc.) served for over 700 years as professional poets primarily to the Lords of the Isles and later to the MacDonalds of Clanranald, among other prominent Scottish families and clans. The Red Book of Clanranald, one of Gaelic Scotland’s literary treasures, was penned by successive generations of the Clan MacMhuirich.
Today, the Society is a leading foundation that focuses on celebrating the Scots-Gaelic origins of the famed literary clan as well as producing programs and events to honor Scotland’s rich culture and ancestry. The Society is a leading participant in New York Tartan Week activities and created and hosts the annual Tartan Day observance at the Ellis Island Immigration Museum.