Gentle. Playful. Warm.  An enveloping feeling of welcome that is effervescent and buzzing with life.  The lasting, echoing flavor of a very good memory.  An evening with The Boston Gay Men’s Chorus is more than just your standard choral event.  Each song is lovingly selected at the hands of a dedicated conductor and music director, rehearsed and molded under the tutelage of a brilliant team of artists and musicians with the common goal to peak in perfection during performance time.  What is so inspiring to me about the BGMC is their ability to move an audience through a journey of emotions without ever feeling preachy or self-important.

This year’s holiday concert, Our Home For The Holidays is a wonderful collection of music that spans centuries and continents to evoke a most colorful aural display.  As with many other BGMC holiday concerts, two very distinct portions of the show equally delight and captivate the audience.  For the ease of this review, we’ll call them the “traditions” portion of the show, and the portion of the show that my companion so aptly referred to as, “a feast for the eyes”.

During the “traditions” portion of the concert, the audience was embraced by a few classic John Rutter carols, and then a trio of Rachmaninoff songs.  My heart almost burst when the chorus started the first few notes of “Rejoice, O Virgin”, a personal favorite of mine.  I have never heard it sung in an all male arrangement and it was every bit as beautiful as I imagined it would be.  After Conrad Susa’s “A Christmas Garland” which offered a lovely and delicate trio, and a brief intermission, the chorus reassembled and welcomed Kerry Dowling to the stage.  I have extolled my love for Dowling before (Hi, I love you!) but to hear her perform Fred Small’s “Not In Our Town” (arranged by Kevin Robison) was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.  With the chorus behind her in perfect harmony, Dowling’s cogent voice endowed the audience with an extremely harrowing tale of a community coming together to take a stand against anti-Semitism, focusing on the experience of a young Jewish boy and his family.  I was absolutely a mess of tears.  It was remarkably moving and powerful, not just because of Dowling’s vocal prowess, but because the chorus itself underscored her with such resolute enthusiasm.  It is a piece I will not forget for a long time.

Upon the heels of such a moving moment, the “feast for the eyes” portion of the concert breathed a buoyant holiday humor into the room without circumventing the touching music which came before it.  The BGMC never lets me down during the second half of their holiday concert!  This year, the dance team, dressed as elves, led the chorus in a brilliant, original Kevin Robinson medley, charmingly titled “The Elves’ Broadway Christmas”.  Show tune favorites were mixed with classic Christmas lyrics to produce a completely hysterical tribute that any friend of Dorothy (and friend of friend of Dorothy) would be completely tickled by.  I especially loved the Phantom of The Opera and Les Miserables references.  Dowling took to the stage again as Mrs. Claus to help end the night with a bang during “Christmas Samba” where the band of merry elves in Mariachi outfits shook their bottoms across the stage and danced around Dowling in a two foot tall frosted fruit hat!  She had the audience in tears again for the night, only this time time they were tears of joy.  What a fabulous way to celebrate this holiday season!

The BGMC continues to bring inventive holiday concerts year after year- I was shocked to discover that this was my fifth holiday concert and I have adored each and every one.  I never tire of their devotion to the audience- not only during performance, but throughout the year in their support through various outreach programs.  BGMC is unquestionably my choice for yearly donations, and I think it should be yours too.  I’ve decided to provide the link to their contribution area because I’m that serious about it.  Bravo again, friends, and Feliz Navidad!