CLARKS SUMMIT — Several musical bells were placed upon a royal purple tablecloth in front of the sanctuary at Clarks Summit United Methodist Church Dec. 2. The Wallenpaupack Middle School Bell Choir played them to ring in the Christmas season at the Wally Gordon Community Singers annual Christmas concert. This year, the concert was called Carols and Bells.
The bell choir, which consists of seventh and eighth-grade students, was invited to accompany the singers, as well as the Clarks Summit UMC Chapel and Celestial Choirs as they performed newly arranged secular and non-secular Christmas pieces.
They were invited by Loriann Kerber, director of the Wally Gordon Singers. She works in the same school district as choir director and bell choir director Shaun Stuart, who grew up in Glenburn. During a teacher in-service period in the spring, Kerber bounced the idea of doing a concert with bells. Stuart liked the idea so, together they went to J.W. Pepper, a warehouse of sheet music in Philadelphia, where they found arrangements of Christmas songs for bells.
Stuart worked with 13 music students, some in band and some in chorus, to form the bell choir.
“They (students) are part of the reason I enjoy coming to work,” he said. “They just hunger for music.”
Stuart taught the bell choir students how to rotate stations to fully understand the octaves.
“You’re seeing every instrument of the band, every voice part of the choir, and everything in between with all kinds of backgrounds,” he told the audience. “And taking those musicians and giving them one instrument.”
The students enjoy being in bell choir.
“It teaches you a lot,” said eighth-grade student Lilly Hapke. “We’re like a family.”
“We are just one big family,” added eighth-grade student Maya Pagano. “We all trust each other and depend on each other to make a piece work.”
After performing a prelude to kick off the concert, the bell choir accompanied the Clarks Summit UMC Chapel and Celestial Choirs and the Wally Gordon Singers to a rendition of “O Come All Ye Faithful.” Many of the songs performed afterwards had the word “bell” in their title to go with the concerts’ theme. They sang the “Carol of the Bells” and “Ring, Bells of Christmas,” which had a sampling of “Carol of the Bells.” “Carols, Bells and Holly” was a medley including “Good King Wenceslas,” “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day” and “Deck the Halls.”
The Wally Gordon Singers Male Quartet, which consists of Don Anderson (tenor), Dale Thomas (tenor), Jim Arscott (baritone) and Roger Clapp (bass), sang a few Christmas songs. Before singing the first song, Anderson mentioned that “Silent Night” was first performed 200 years ago in Salzburg, Austria. For their second song, they sang an arrangement of “The Christmas Waltz,” completed by Mark Hayes in 2015.
“You know this song,” Clapp said. “If you think of what the tune is, you will know it when you hear it.”
The quartet concluded with a jazzy version of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” with snapping fingers and Clapp and Arscott imitating a bass.
The concert ended with the bell choir, singers and choir performing together a moving rendition of “Let There Be Peace On Earth.”
Carols and Bells was the first big concert for 7-year-old twins Amira and Zoey Grace Lindsey, both members of the Clarks Summit UMC choir. They admitted to being nervous but were glad to do it.
“I like that we got to sing behind the bells,” said Amira.
“We sing because we have love in our hearts,” added Zoey Grace.
