Last weekend, our church had its annual Christmas Carol concert in the beautiful Cathédrale St-Sauveur (Holy Savior Cathedral) in Aix. The cathedral was built in fits and starts from the 5th century to the 15th century and is known for its interesting combination of architectural styles. The site on which it was built has been considered sacred for thousands of years. It first hosted a pre-Roman pagan temple, then a Roman temple, and finally the Christian church that stands today. At the concert, there were about 1200 French, English and other nationalities in attendance. This was our family's third year participating in the concert and this year there were four of us; Nick and I sang in the Carol Choir and I also sang in the newly formed Gospel Choir.
Sarah moved from Children's Choir to Ushering...
and Lindsey was in the audience!
Hilary How Rivera and her assistant, Shane, did a great job of directing all three choirs...
The cathedral looked beautiful and we had some great speakers who told the story of Jesus' birth through scripture...
The last song of the evening is always Silent Night. For this carol, all the lights in the cathedrale are turned out (and it is really dark!). While we sing Silent Night acappela, one single candle is carried from the rear of the church to the alter where all ministers, priests and pastors present congregate to light their candles. They in turn, light the choir's candles and then the light moves throughout the cathedrale until everyone's it lit. These photos hardly do the whole experience justice, but they give you an idea of how magical it is...
One of our church members, Apryl Anderson, put together her photos and made a YouTube video of the performance. If you watch it, the background music "Oh, Happy Day" is sung by our gospel choir and that is our good friend and choir director, Hilary, singing the solo. Maybe if you look very closely you might find a few photos of Nick, Sarah and I.
Concert video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkOSsVsuGBE&eurl=http://www.facebook.com/inbox/readmessage.php?t=1022250529266
The second video is of the concert rehersal the night before.
Concert rehersal:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Phe2qBWxZJA
Here's a photographic look at our walk home from the concert that night.
The Hotel de Ville....
Rue Gaston de Saporta...
The Cours Mirabeau...
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