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Singing news for the holiday season.

First, there’s a new sing this year at Silver Lake Mill in Dayton, Va. Come and sing the (somewhat rare) Harmonia Sacra Christmas tunes (plus others) on Sunday, Dec. 4, at 4 p.m. It’s the mill’s bicentennial year, making it a rare sing venue that was around when Harmonia Sacra was first published. It’s a smaller singing space with good acoustics, but come early to get a spot. Andrea Early will be the moderator.

Next, on New Year’s Day, due to a construction project at Weavers Mennonite, we’ll continue the Weaver’s tradition in 2023 at Park View Mennonite Church, 1600 College Avenue, Harrisonburg. The New Year’s Day sing is the longest-running sing we have, and this is just one more wrinkle in its storied history. The sing starts at 7 and the sound will be just as glorious. Come and sing.

Here’s a version of the tune NEW YEAR, with Weavers references, to get to ready.

To all our singing friends:

Because of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the impossibility of singing safely together on this New Year’s Day, the annual sing at Weavers Mennonite Church is postponed, with great regret, until we can gather again.

This is a tough one, and even though it’s not unexpected, having to tell it and knowing that it means we won’t see each other on New Year’s Day, the sound that has filled Weavers Church since 1903 on that day won’t be heard, and that we do not know when we’ll do this again is more difficult than I expected.

There have been two other years—1919 and 1929—in which the sing was postponed due to epidemics—influenza, in those cases. We believe that both were eventually held in March. That may be a little soon for 2021, given the known vaccine distribution schedule, but we pray that 2021 will not pass completely without a sing. There’s no fault to be found, just frustration—which I’m sure you have all felt with other planned events in this oddest of years. Keep the faith and keep singing, to yourselves for now, and think how glorious it will be when we can join our voices again in a better time.

Watch this page for more news when it happens. For now, from the tune New Year:

May each in the day
of his coming say,
“I’ve fought my way through,
and finished the work thou dids’t give me to do.”