St. Andrew’s was overflowing with holiday cheer this weekend, as the school community celebrated the season with a bevy of arts performances and student life events. 

To kick off the weekend, the SAS Orchestra performed a holiday concert in Engelhard Hall on Friday night. The Orchestra is led by Director of Instrumental Music Dr. Geiersbach and this year's Orchestra presidents, Sophie Xu ’23 and Cora Birknes ’23, who have created a warm, fun environment in which students can express themselves weekly. You can watch their performance of holiday classics here. 

The Warner Gallery also held its first student art show gallery opening of the year on Friday evening. Student artworks in a variety of mediums—photography, paint, charcoal, multimedia, printmaking, and more—were on display, and Film Studies students also had the chance to screen their short films for the school community at the beginning of the opening.

On Saturday night, Engelhard was a full house as students and families turned out to support student dancers in their annual performance of The Nutcracker. Led by Director of Dance Avi Gold, student dancers performed a selection of works from the well-loved Christmas ballet. Dance students have a very short window of time between Thanksgiving Break and Winter Break in which to rehearse for this performance, and their performances were sparkling! You can watch the show here.

After the Nutcracker, students headed over to Founders for holiday fun. Activities included a gingerbread house-building competition in the Dining Hall, Christmas card-making and holiday origami in the Main Common Room, holiday movie nights in various classrooms, and hot cocoa and cotton candy for all. 

Finally, on Sunday evening, the school community gathered in the A. Felix duPont, Jr. Memorial Chapel for the annual Service of Lessons & Carols. This is the first time since 2019 that the school has been able to hold an additional Lessons & Carols service earlier in the day for families, alumni, and the general public. It was wonderful to be able to welcome our extended St. Andrew's family back into the Chapel for this tradition! The Andrean Ensemble, led by Director of Choral Music Quinn Kerrane P’19,’24, performed a selection of Christmas hymns, and students, faculty, staff, and trustees read Advent passages. The service was preceded by a chamber music performance given by a small group of instrumental music students. You can watch both performances here.

And, throughout the weekend, student volunteers traveled to locations around Middletown to “ring the bell” for the Salvation Army!

“Thank you for a wonderful weekend of the arts!” Arts Department Co-Chair Ann Taylor ’86 P’18 said to the community on Monday. “From the Gallery opening, to the Chamber Group and the Orchestra, to the Nutcracker, to the Service of Lessons and Carols—it was a fabulous weekend and you should all be very proud of your work. Thank you for sharing your gifts with this community. Your work reflected the joy and the hope which this season brings.”