Photo courtesy of James Legrand. Students gathered together in the chapel to celebrate the yearly Mount Holyoke musical tradition.
By Anna Ji ’27
Staff Writer
Many students, staff and alumni joined in the fun brought by the warm and inclusive 2023 Vespers Concert. This year, Vespers had its debut on the night of Dec. 1 in Boston’s Old South Church and was hosted again on Dec. 3 at Mount Holyoke College’s very own Abbey Memorial Chapel.
Vespers has been a long-standing tradition at Mount Holyoke, with over 120 years of history. According to Mount Holyoke’s official website, the event is a space where “the community comes together to celebrate light and togetherness on a dark and cold December night.”
Colin Britt, the director of choral activities, expressed that there has been both joy and pressure in hosting. Britt joined Mount Holyoke’s faculty this year, and Vespers had been one of his many firsts when it comes to traditions at the College. To prepare for the event, he had made careful consideration when it came to choosing music so that it would be representative of many traditions and not just Christmas, in hopes of improving inclusiveness for the repertoire.
“Whenever I program any multi-work concert (meaning lots of smaller works, rather than one or two larger major works), I always try to find a balance between music from different time periods, different compositional voices, contrasting difficulty and contrasting tempos — fast, slow, medium, etc,” Britt said.
Although Britt admits that the event required “an extra amount of attention and scrutiny,” the enjoyment he felt had outweighed the pressure. “Personally, I loved the solemnity of the candlelight procession combined with the joyful nature of the holiday music. I also really loved collaborating with other performing groups on campus, specifically the Klezmer Kapelye, the English Handbell Ensemble, the Flute Choir and the Jazz Ensembles,” he said. “And there's just something about this time of year — the change in the weather, the contrast of the lights against the growing darkness and the beauty of this music that will always feel special to me.”
Aside from Britt, Mount Holyoke students in their first year also had a lot to say about their first time experiencing the event. Hannah Rosenman ’27 performed in this year’s Vespers as a Glee Club member. She recalls that a lot of things were going on campus the weekend the performance occurred. “[There was] a lot of sickness going around so not everyone was able to perform in all shows, [and] our conductor [Britt] had a baby due the next day [after the performance]!”
Despite being tired due to the high intensity of the performances, Rosenman still described Vespers as “joyous, community building, innately special, emotional [and] exciting.”
Furthermore, she expressed that the stress that spread among the group before the performances would later contribute to its great success. The event brought Rosenman great memories; she enjoyed the candle procession, which included “being able to light the advent wreath before the ceremony … [and] walking in the dark with our candles.” She also reminisced how everyone in the Glee Club got emotional during their last song for graduating seniors.
Nicole Mattiacci ’27 was an audience member for the last Vespers that took place in Abbey Memorial Chapel. As a first-year, her first Vespers “felt haunting and ethereal.” Her favorite part of the event was singing “Sleigh Ride” with everyone towards the end of the show. “Even though I am notoriously bad at singing, it was very fun to sing such a classic song with the MHC community!” Mattiacci said.
She also stressed the communal meaning brought by Vespers.
“A word I would use to describe it is ‘community’ because it was really cool to see students, family, friends and alums all come together to celebrate the voices of Mount Holyoke.” To build on this point, Mattiacci said, “I see an aspect of belonging from this event. There was raucous applause after every group’s performance, and everyone stood up and sang when encouraged, and sat in silence when the moment called for it. The MHC community is vast and diverse, but it felt like in those moments, we all understood each other and came together as one community.”