Pops concert a treat for Port Arthur area

Published 10:04 am Thursday, December 13, 2018

 

You know the songs: “Sleigh Ride,” “Let it Snow,” the “Hallelujah Chorus.”

There will be lots more, too, when the Symphony of Southeast Texas travels to Port Arthur for a Christmas concert sponsored by Motiva Enterprises LLC at 7 p.m. Tuesday.

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The concert is a gift from Motiva to its employees, but the company has let the whole community get in on it, too. The concert will be presented at Woodrow Wilson Early College High School, a splendid, traditional setting rich in community memories, with a thousand seats available — free to the public. That means you.

This is the second time that the SOST will play in Port Arthur this year; the first came in May before a robust crowd at the Sam and Linda Monroe Performing Arts Center, just down the street.

“It’s a wonderful space,” Maistro Chelsea Tipton said of the Woodrow Wilson Auditorium. “It’s not so large that the audience does not feel like it’s part of the show.”

But it’s large enough to accommodate families and friends for an evening of Christmas music, pops style, with a 55-member orchestra.

Special guests will include members of the Port Arthur Memorial High School Choir, led by Lonnie Reed, director of chorale activities at Memorial. About 30 of the 120 choir members will participate.

“It’s not too many times that a high school choir sings with a full orchestra,” Reed said. “To experience the colors of an orchestra, we are grateful to them.”

And it’s not too many times that the public can enjoy a festive evening of superior music at no cost. Come dressed for a relaxed performance and a seasonal treat.

We are thrilled to see the Beaumont-based symphony orchestra in the shadow of Port Arthur’s seawall for a second time in 2018. The SOST is a regional orchestra, and their two performances in Port Arthur this year encourage the Greater Port Arthur public to think of them as their orchestra, too.

We are thrilled to see the symphony at the Woodrow Wilson auditorium, as well, a setting rich in Port Arthur history and lore, where national acts like Elvis Presley and Johnny Mathis, Jerry Reed and Fats Domino, Crystal Gayle and Frankie Avalon have played.

Add to that list the Symphony of Southeast Texas.

Mother Nature won’t “Let It Snow” on Tuesday, which will be seasonably pleasant — high of 63, low of 50 — under partly clear skies. There may be a sleigh sighting yet.

The symphony’s May concert was intended, in part, to reacquaint Greater Port Arthur and Mid County people with the pleasure of beautiful music in a comfortable place. Now we get to try it again, in the happiest time of the year.

You’ve been invited.

Now go.