44th Annual Yuletide Feaste

Northwest Missouri State University’s Madraliers will host their 44th annual Yuletide Feaste with an elegant royal banquet with performances by Recorder Consort, the Royale Brass Quintet and The Royal Theatrical Players.

The Feaste will take place at 6:30 p.m. Friday, Dec. 8, and Saturday, Dec. 9, in the J.W. Jones Student Union Ballroom.

“The annual tradition of the Yuletide Feaste is a tremendous opportunity for the students, faculty and citizens of the surrounding community to come together and celebrate the holiday season,” Dr. Brian Lanier, the Madraliers conductor and a Northwest professor of music, said. “The student performers are able to sing, act and play for the audience in a beautiful setting reminiscent of a banquet hall from the Renaissance.”

Tickets are $31.50 and may be purchased by check or cash in Room 101 of the Olive DeLuce Fine Arts Building. Credit card orders may be placed online at www.nwmissouri.edu/finearts/music/yuletide.htm.

Attendance is limited to 320 guests each evening, and all tickets are reserved. No tickets will be sold at the door.

At the Yuletide Feaste, guests celebrate and rediscover Christmas through the evening’s programs and festivities, highly stylized after old England. The menu, performances and decorations are reminiscent of 16th century Tudor England.

The menu includes cranberry brie tartlets, craved steamship of beef with au jus and horseradish cream sauce, rosemary roasted turkey breast with rich turkey gravy, sour cream and chive mashed Yukon gold potatoes, brown sugar and butter glazed carrots, green beans with shallot confit and grape tomatoes, and Dutch apple pie with caramel sauce and cinnamon vanilla whipped cream.

“The students who participate in the Yuletide Feaste are part of a 44-year tradition that connects them to hundreds of performers from the past,” Lanier said. “Many of these students will go out to be music directors at schools and churches and can benefit from this experience if they decide to produce their own version of the Feaste.”

The Madraliers choral ensemble is a select group, consisting of 35 undergraduate students representing a variety of disciplines and majors at Northwest. In recent years, the choir has been invited to perform for prestigious choral organizations, including the American Choral Directors Association and the Missouri Music Educators Association.