Welcome Yule!

No matter what your personal creed, the real reason for the season is the Winter Solstice, the shortest day, which is why this time of year so many of the world’s cultures pull out all the stops with music, drink, evergreen, gifts, and bizarre localized customs like the Yule Goat (see my post of Dec. 9). It all goes back to man’s primordial desire to restore the sun and drive the cold winter away.

This Thursday morning on WPRB, we’ll mark the year’s shortest day – and the longest night – with abundant reflection and revelry, all distilled into a cheering playlist of music for midwinter.

Of course, the morning will be heavily slanted toward the reigning midwinter festival of Christmas. There will be at least two large-scale Christmas works for chorus and orchestra – Josef Rheinberger’s “The Star of Bethlehem” and Rutland Boughton’s “Bethlehem” – to anchor all the pagan tomfoolery.

I hope you’ll join me in piling the wood high, in anticipation of a midwinter bonfire, this Thursday morning from 6 to 11 EST, on WPRB 103.3 FM and wprb.com. If all goes as planned, it should go something like this, on Classic Ross Amico: