Christine Baranski has teamed with the Skylark Vocal Ensemble for a unique rendition of Charles Dickens' “A Christmas Carol.”.
Credit card skimmers discovered at Circle K near Stone Oak, Hollywood Park police chief saysFormer San Antonio City Council staffer arrested for threats toward District 9 office, affidavit saysCity housing administrator signed for dead homeowner; other employees altered records, audit finds‘We’re devastated’: Thousands of dollars stolen during break-in at historic VFW Post 76 downtownRomeo Santos, Prince Royce announce 2026 performance at Frost Bank CenterDrizzle, a cold front, and a Christmas heat wave.
An update on what’s aheadFILE - Anna Hicks prepares a measles, mumps and rubella vaccine at the Andrews County Health Department, Tuesday, April 8, 2025, in Andrews, Texas. Read full article: Local experts warn US may lose measles elimination status after 25 years Michael Allen Loving was arrested for a similar crime in late November, targeting a South Side H-E-B jewelry storeNext photo Skylark Artistic Director Matthew Guard and Christine Baranski are interviewed beside"A Christmas Carol In Prose; Being a Ghost Story of Christmas" by Charles Dickens, Dec. 1843," at The Morgan Library & Museum, in New York, Monday, Dec. 1, 2025. Skylark Artistic Director Matthew Guard and Christine Baranski are interviewed beside"A Christmas Carol In Prose; Being a Ghost Story of Christmas" by Charles Dickens, Dec. 1843," at The Morgan Library & Museum, in New York, Monday, Dec. 1, 2025. Skylark Artistic Director Matthew Guard and Christine Baranski are interviewed beside"A Christmas Carol In Prose; Being a Ghost Story of Christmas" by Charles Dickens, Dec. 1843," at The Morgan Library & Museum, in New York, Monday, Dec. 1, 2025. Skylark Artistic Director Matthew Guard and Christine Baranski are interviewed beside"A Christmas Carol In Prose; Being a Ghost Story of Christmas" by Charles Dickens, Dec. 1843," at The Morgan Library & Museum, in New York, Monday, Dec. 1, 2025. i was in the playground outside St. Matthew’s Church in Bedford, New York, about three years ago when she came across Matthew Guard, artistic director of the Grammy-nominated Skylark Vocal Ensemble.“I was a fangirl basically,” she recalled. “And I think we just said, `Wouldn’t it be fun to do something together?’”last December at The Morgan Library & Museum in New York, which owns the original manuscript of the 1843 classic. A recording was made last June at the Church of the Redeemer in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, and released Dec. 4 on the LSO Live label. She will perform it again with the group on Thursday night at the Morgan, which is displaying the manuscript through Jan. 11, and again the following night at The Breakers in Newport, Rhode Island, where she will again portray the acerbic Agnes van Rhijn when Season 4 of HBO’s “I have this thing about keeping language alive, keeping beautiful, well-written language,” she said. “Dickens, Stoppard, Shakespeare. We’re getting awfully lazy in our use of the English language.”Baranski leaned on the skills that earned her an Emmy for “Cybill” and Tonys for “The Real Thing” and “Rumors.” “You get to bring to life a lot of different characters, none the least of which is Ebenezer,” she said at the library this month. “It’s wonderful for an actor to differentiate in as subtle a way as possible these different characters. As an acting piece, it’s wonderful. And not many women have done it. It’s been done by Alistair Cooke and Patrick Stewart and Patrick Page and all these great actors — but I get to do it with a chorus.” Guard weaves in underscoring by composer Benedict Sheehan with Baranski’s words and 10 carols that include “Silent Night” and “Deck the Halls” plus “Auld Lang Syne.”“This manuscript itself is about 30,000 words and we needed about 5,000 to make it a concert length,” Guard said. “I tried to create space in the narrative for obvious musical exclamation points or emotional feelings, almost like arias in an opera.” Sheehan had worked together with Guard on a 2020 recording “Once Upon a Time” that weaved together the Brothers Grimm’s “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves” and Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Little Mermaid.” “I said why don’t you commission me to write choral underscoring for the narrative that can kind of stitch together these different choral pieces?” Sheehan said. Baranski got narration experience in 2023 when she replaced Liev Schreiber with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra at Carnegie Hall for Beethoven’s “Egmont.” “I could do this the rest of my career,” she thought at the time. “Just put me in a concert hall surrounded by great musicians.”After working with dialect coach Howard Samuelsohn, Baranski practiced on Zoom to hone a 19th-century voice and avoid cliché. “I said this is a good warm up for Aunt Agnes because it’s that kind of speech we were taught at Juilliard,” the 73-year-old Baranski said, recalling lessons from Edith Skinner decades ago. “Sometimes it’s just a question of modulating your voice, just different rhythms and staccato or legato,” she said. “I want the voice of the Ghost of Christmas past to be disembodied… ethereal.”“We take from each other,” she said. “When the chorus first heard my version of it, I think it subtly influenced the feeling of it and I take from the mood of the carol and bring it into my interpretation.” “It’s a really exciting back-and-forth actually,” Guard said. “It’s not really totally clear who’s driving the bus at times.”“We want to film this someday in the Morgan,” she said. “Make this a yearly event at the Morgan, because here’s the manuscript and people. It’s just one of those things like Handel’s `Messiah’ or `The Nutcracker.’” She’s going to gift the CD to her grandchildren, four boys ranging from ages 2 to 12. Among her previous holiday experiences was portraying Martha May Whovier in the 2000 movie “Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas.” “They’re curiously not interested in my even being Martha May in `The Grinch,’” Baranski explained. “Their friends sometimes say: `That’s your grandmother.’ But I just want to be their grandma — do you know what I mean — and not somebody?” Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.Credit card skimmers discovered at Circle K near Stone Oak, Hollywood Park police chief saysSouth Texas man sets world record for oldest wingsuit jumperSan Antonio mom gets holiday homecoming surprise from active-duty military sonsResidents upset with speeding and lack of crosswalks at West Side intersectionSan Antonio family navigates life separated amid $30K immigration battleSan Antonio Catholic faithful embark on traditional journey honoring Our Lady of Guadalupe🦍 Congo Falls gorilla exhibit at San Antonio Zoo to open this weekendFrom San Antonio to Jamaica: North Side restaurant ships donations for Hurricane Melissa reliefUS credit card debt rising slower before Christmas this year compared to 2024, Fed data showsCulebra Road ranks among San Antonio’s most dangerous traffic corridors, data shows
Matthew Guard Hans Christian Andersen Howard Samuelsohn Patrick Page Edith Skinner Martha May Whovier Entertainment Christine Baranski Ebenezer Scrooge Agnes Van Rhijn Patrick Stewart Charles Dickens Benedict Sheehan Julian Fellowes
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