“Welcome Yule! – A Midwinter Celebration” returns for a third year to the Gloucester Unitarian Universalist Meetinghouse.

The Welcome Yule Chorus, Children’s Troupe and Folk Orchestra, under the direction of

Rose Sheehan, will present this lively, seasonal pageant on Saturday, December 10, 2016 at 4:00 PM in the sanctuary of Gloucester’s historic Unitarian Universalist Meetinghouse. The program is expected to run two hours including a fifteen minute intermission.

Yule is the name for the old, pre-Christian Winter Solstice festivals celebrated throughout northern Europe. ‘Welcome Yule!’ highlights symbols and festivities associated with those older festivals – wassailing, holly and ivy, yule logs, candles – and includes Christmas lore that blends the old customs with the newer festival.

 

This family friendly show is filled with music, dance, songs and stories for the longest night. It features a mix of traditional pieces, as well as contemporary works. A mummers’ play, ‘Saint George and the Dragon’ is a comic reworking of an English ritual drama in which a character dies and is brought back to life.

There will be a Yule Log Procession in which the audience is invited to touch the log with a holly leaf and make a wish for the new year.
A number of songs invite the audience to sing-a-long, making for a fun participatory event.

Welcome Yule is produced by Folk Life Studio in cooperation with the Gloucester Unitarian Universalist Church.

Tickets are available at the door.
Ticket prices are
$15 for adults;
$10 for seniors (65+) and children five through sixteen;
$35 family cap;
age four and under free.