Sing Your Soul Back Together*
“With so much turmoil in our world, I was at a loss as to what I would write this month, but then I heard a children’s choir sing Benjamin Britten’s ‘A Ceremony of Carols,’ and I knew. December is a month of celebrations. Various faiths observe their winter Holydays with music and song. For music soothes the soul and all of us—our country, our world, our beleaguered planet—are sorely in need of soothing at this time.”—Helen Noakes
Waking Point
By Helen Noakes
SAN FRANCISCO California—(Weekly Hubris)—1 December 2022—With so much turmoil in our world, I was at a loss as to what I would write this month, but then I heard a children’s choir sing Benjamin Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols, and I knew.
December is a month of celebrations. Various faiths observe their winter Holydays with music and song. For music soothes the soul and all of us—our country, our world, our beleaguered planet—are sorely in need of soothing at this time.
Make this a time of peace, of sharing, of embracing. A time to rejoice in our shared humanity. A time of receiving and giving gifts.
And so, my gift to you is the music of the diverse voices of our world.
Raise your voices and sing. Share your joy. And, for a moment, just for this moment, forget the worries and burdens of the world and exult in the beautiful noise our harmonious voices make.
Hanukkah, December 18 (The Maccabeats, “I Have a Little Dreidel”)
Yule, December 21 (Miguel Berkemeier, “Music for Yule,” from “Winster Solstice Songs/Autumn’s End”)
Christmas, December 25 (Texas Boys Choir, “A Ceremony of Carols,” by Benjamin Britten, staged version, January 22, 2017)
Kwanzaa, December 26 (Lovely Hoffman, “A Kwanzaa Song”)
Many blessings to you, your families, and friends.
*Paraphrasing Cleo Wade’s “She sang my soul back together.”
Helen Noakes
Helen Noakes is a playwright, novelist, writer, art historian, linguist, and Traditional Reiki Master, who was brought up in and derives richness from several of the world’s great traditions and philosophies. She believes that writing should engage and entertain, but also inform and inspire. She also believes that because the human race expresses itself in words, it is words, in the end, that will show us how very similar we are and how foolish it is to think otherwise. (Author Head Shot Augment: René Laanen.)