Christmas Concert and Dinner Update

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Our annual Christmas Concert & Dinner will be held at Turner Hall, 3001 S Stoughton Road in Madison, on Sunday December 15, 2013 at 3:00 p.m. After the concert, there will be a visit from Sankt Nikolaus followed by dinner at approximately 5:00 p.m.

We’re past the deadline for reservations, but if you didn’t quite get around to making a reservation, don’t worry – there will be tickets available at the door.

Tickets are $23/adult & children 13 or older. Children under 13 eat free when with an adult also eating dinner. Cash bar. Tickets for the concert only are $8/adult. For the full details, please click on the link below:

Christmas Concert & Dinner Information

Christmas Concert and Dinner 2013

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Christmas Concert & Dinner Information

Please make your reservations by December 10th. Email xmas@madisonmaennerchor.org or call Alan at (608) 335-0770.

Lutefisk dinner 2013

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Last Saturday a couple of us attended a lutefisk dinner at Christ Lutheran Church in DeForest. For those who are unfamiliar with lutefisk, it is air-dried cod preserved with lye. It’s a traditional food in the Scandinavian countries, and in the Midwest lutefisk dinners are common in the fall, typically sponsored by a Lutheran church with a Norwegian heritage.

The lutefisk dinner at Christ Lutheran was quite good:

: This lutefisk dinner was held at Christ Lutheran Church in DeForest

: We didn’t have reservations so we had to wait about 50 minutes before being seated

: Clockwise from the top: mashed potatoes and gravy, rutabaga, meatballs, lutefisk with melted butter, cranberry sauce and coleslaw

: I didn’t get a picture of the lefse (which was quite good) but here’s dessert: pie. I choose the cherry pie which was very good.

If you are wondering why a post about a Norwegian lutefisk dinner is on the web site of a German mens choir, just consider it an exploration of the stinky foods of other cultures. Or perhaps it’s because the web master had two great-grandparents who were born in Norway. Skål!

Oktoberfest at Turner Hall

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The choir took part in the Oktoberfest activities at Madison’s Turner Hall on Saturday October 26, 2013. The keg was tapped at 1:00 by the Burgermeister Dick Blatter. Music was provided by Jerry Stueber and The Music Vendors – we sang at around 4:00 during the break between the bands.

Other highlights include Ralph Clasen’s cooking demonstration and the supervised open gym for the younger guests. Check out the pictures below:

: Burgermeister Blatter opens the festivities at 1:00

: The volleyball folks showed up for their free beer and left

: Plenty of good food was available

: Jerry Stueber provided the music for the first half of the afternoon

: One of the highlights was a cooking class with Ralph Clasen

: preparing Wiener Schnitzel

: Clockwise from the top: creamed carrots, savoy cabbage, Wiener Schnitzel and roesti potatoes. It was delicious!

: The Madison Maennerchor sang a few songs around 4:00

: We were too lazy to get up, so we sang from our seats

: Two young guests taking a break from the gym

: Actually they had to be bribed with cookies and cupcakes to leave the gym for these pictures

: Prosit!

: The Music Vendors provided the entertainment later in the afternoon and evening

Kommers 2013

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The 2013 WSB Kommers was held in Sheboygan on Saturday October 19. We tied for third place with the Milwaukee Damenchor. Milwaukee Liederkranz was second and MGV Harmonia from Kenosha took home the traveling trophy.

The Gesangverein Concordia did a great job of organizing the competition and the dinner. Next year it will be our turn to host Kommers.

Here are a few pictures:

: Leaving Turner Hall

: The beverage service on the bus was excellent

: Arriving in Sheboygan

: Social chairmen past and present

: After a brief warmup, we got down to business

: Parade of flags

: The competition was in the gym of the Christ Child Academy

: Dinner was pretty good.

: At least they weren’t white socks this year…

: Another triumph of engineering – all those years in college finally paid off.

: And the crowd goes wild!

: Kenosha got to take home the trophy this time…

Austrian Wine Festival

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Hello friends–please spread the word and invite your friends! Here’s a chance to enjoy a great afternoon of entertainment this Sunday, October 13 at the annual Wine Fest. It’s a friendly mix of Austrian Volksmusik, Viennese songs and operetta, humor and skits, and you get to dance and sing along!
________________________

You’re invited!
33rd Annual Wine Fest
Klub Österreich
Austrian American Society of Milwaukee

Sunday, October 13, 2013
at the Schwabenhof in Menomonee Falls
N56 W14750 Silver Spring Drive

Doors open at 1:00 p.m.
Program begins at 2:00 p.m.

Enjoy Authentic Austrian Volksmusik, Elegant Viennese Song, Skits, Good Humor, Old-World Culture and a chance to sing and dance along! Featuring the exquisite zither music of Kurt von Eckroth and the graceful singing of soprano Rachel Renee.

Tickets $8.00 at the door on the day of the event—no pre-sales.
Additionally, fine food and beverages will be available from the Austrian Club and from the Schwabenhof bar and restaurant staff.

For more information contact:
Doug Scott, (414) 614-2235
dougliness@gmail.com

Wauktoberfest 2013-09-22

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The Madison Maennerchor sang at Wauktoberfest on Sunday September 22, 2013 and Endres Manufacturing in Waunakee. Although the news from the Packer game was not so good, it was a great afternoon to be outside and enjoy the food, music, beer and dachshund races.

We sang at 2:30 and then took a break to watch the dachshund races and then sang again from 3:30 to after 4:00. In addition to the pictures below, there are a couple of short videos as well.

The dachshund race finals
MMC singing “Ein Prosit” during the second set

: Getting ready for our first set. Yes, this is all the warming up that we needed; we’re just that good.

: After our first set, we went to watch the dachshund races

: The middle divider was new this year – it didn’t really seem to work out very well

: Getting ready to sing Ein Prosit during our second set

: We took a short “bier pause” during the second set

: Another successful Wauktoberfest!

Choral Concert – Die Erste Walpurgisnacht (Mendessohn)

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The University of Wisconsin Choral Union and UW Chamber Orchestra will present a concert containing two works, Dona Nobis Pacem by the English composer of Welsh descent Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Die Erste Walpurgisnacht by German composer Felix Mendelssohn. The concert will be presented on Saturday November 23rd (7:30 pm) and Sunday November 24th (2:00 pm) in UW Mills Hall, Mosse Humanities Building. Please call the School of Music’s Concert Line (608) 265-2787 for tickets. You can also purchase tickets on line at the UW Choral Union web site. Tickets are $15 for general admission and $8 for students/seniors.

Die erste Walpurgisnacht (The First Walpurgis Night) is a secular cantata for soloists and choir composed by Felix Mendelssohn. The words are taken from a poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. The text involves Druids in the Harz mountains The piece is about 36 minutes in length. Sung in German.

The sections are titled:

Es lacht der Mai (May is in full bloom) Tenor & chorus of Druids & people.
Könnt ihr so verwegen handeln? (Could you be so rash, so daring?) Alto, old woman, & chorus of wives of the people.
Wer Opfer heut zu bringen scheut (Whoever fears to sacrifice) Baritone, priest, & chorus of Druids.
Verteilt euch, wackre Männer, hier (Divide your forces, valiant men) Chorus of Druid watchmen.
Diese dummen Pfaffenchristen (Christians and their priests are witless) Bass, watchman, & chorus of watchmen.
Kommt mit Zacken und mit Gabeln (Come with prongs and pitchforks) Chorus of Druids and people.
So weit gebracht, dass wir bei Nacht (It’s come so far that now by night) Baritone, priest, & chorus of Druids and people.
Hilf, ach hilf mir, Kriegsgeselle (Help, oh help me, comrade) Tenor & chorus of Christian watchmen.
Die Flamme reinigt sich vom Rauch (The flame is purified by smoke) Baritone, priest, & chorus of Druids and people.

Dona Nobis Pacem (Give Us Peace) by Ralph Vaughan Williams was composed in 1936 to mark the hundredth anninversary of the Huddersfield Choral Society. The texts are taken from Walt Whitman poems, speeches and excerpts from The Bible. It was intended to be a plea for peace. It is scored for soprano and baritone soloists with chorus and orchestra. Sung in English.

References
“Die erste Walpurgisnacht”, p. 226 in The World of the Oratorio, Kurt Pahlen. Portland, OR: Amadeus Press, 1990.
“Die Erste Walprugisnacht”, retrieved from Wikipedia, accessed September 24, 2013. “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Die_erste_Walpurgisnacht”
“Dona Nobis Pacem”, retrieved from Wikipedia, accessed September 24, 2013. “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dona_nobis_pacem_(Vaughan_Williams)”

The Deutscher Sprachatlas Is Back!

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Wednesday, October 9, 2013; 5:30–7:30 p.m.

The Rathskeller, Memorial Union, 800 Langdon Street

The Deutscher Sprachatlas is an important German linguistics atlas in Memorial Library’s German language and literature collection. Unfortunately it has not been available to linguistic students and scholars due to its fragile condition. With funding from the Friends [of the UW-Madison Libraries], the original has been carefully restored by Memorial Library’s Preservation Department and a facsimile created for use in the stacks.

Help us celebrate the unveiling of the restored atlas and facsimile in Der Rathskeller at Memorial Union. You can view the Sprachatlas, listen to German-Wisconsin music, learn about the importance of this document, hear about its preservation, and celebrate Oktoberfest! German-style refreshments will be available. Wunderbar! For more details about the restoration, see the article on page 8 in the

Fall 2013 Friends Newsletter.

Cosponsored by the

Memorial Library Reference and the Collection Preservation Departments, the Department of German, the Max Kade Institute for German-American Studies and Mills Music Library.

Oktoberfest at the Essen Haus 2013-09-14

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The Madison Maennerchor sang at the Essen Haus Oktoberfest on Saturday September 14, 2013. It was a beautiful afternoon to be outside and enjoy the music, food and beer.

Jason Rowe provided the music during the early afternoon, with the Dorf Kappelle taking over at 4:00. We sang a short set of Oktoberfest songs around 3:00 during one of the breaks.