What: Daniel Lapp’s Home for Christmas
When: Friday, Dec. 15, 7:30 p.m.; Saturday, Dec. 16, 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m.
Where: Alix Goolden Performance Hall, 907 Pandora Ave.
Tickets: $20/$12 through ticketfly.com or 888-732-1682
When his skis hit the slopes at Mt. Washington on Monday, choir director and instructor Daniel Lapp will be enjoying his first full day off in … how long?
“I don’t know,” Lapp said with a laugh, followed by a well-earned sigh. “A few months, I guess.”
Lapp, the artistic director of the Victoria Conservatory of Music’s School of Contemporary Music, has plenty to accomplish before his ski holiday comes to pass. He’s deep into rehearsals for Home for Christmas, his annual old-timey Christmas program, which will bring several of Lapp’s projects to the stage for three performances at the Alix Goolden Performance Hall on Friday and Saturday.
His job as the festival director and artistic leader means everything runs through Lapp, from minor details to major obstacles.
Lapp has grown accustomed to the frenzy, but he’s heading into new territory this weekend with the biggest Home For Christmas cast in the event’s 14-year history.
“We’re going to break 200 [participants] this year,” he said. “The sound man is coming over to my place so we can figure out how we’re going to pull this off.”
Though the mechanical details of the event have yet to be ironed out, Lapp has the music program in order — and it’s a good one. Joining the band leader and his myriad choirs, ensembles and orchestras will be Roy Forbes, the popular folk singer from Vancouver. Lapp, who was in a band with Forbes during the late ’80s, said Forbes has been on his must-have list for years.
Lapp will shepherd Folkestra, The Joy of Life Choir, the B.C. Fiddle Orchestra, the Strings of Lights, the Swingin’ Shepherds, and the Shiny Hornaments through a list of Canadian Christmas content by Stan Rogers, Robbie Robertson, Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, Jane Siberry and Bruce Cockburn, among others.
Lapp will also lead the full cast — with Forbes at the fore and Norm McPherson on guitar — through renditions of Forbes hits Mince Meat Tart, Ring the Bells at Midnight and Lifting My Heart.
“I want to establish a new, homegrown, Canadian carol tradition,” he said.
Sarah McLachlan’s Wintersong will also be performed. Lapp played alongside the Grammy Award-winning singer when he travelled to Vancouver last month for a benefit supporting Spirit of the West singer John Mann, who is suffering from early onset Alzheimer’s.
Lapp had the opportunity to play the chorus of the song for McLachlan from a recording on his phone when the two crossed paths in a dressing room before the show.
“I told the [Joy of Life] choir we should record the chorus of the song, so that if I had the chance, I could play it for her,” he said.
Lapp could see that the clip struck an emotional chord with McLachlan, who had written the song — unbeknownst to Lapp — about the death of her mother from cancer.
Does that mean we could see McLachlan in Victoria at some point for a future Home For Christmas concert?
When the energetic Lapp is involved, nothing is out of the question.
“We’ll cross our fingers,” he said. “You never know. Christmas wishes do come true.”
