With Thanksgiving and Black Friday fading in the rearview mirror, Inland families can turn attention to the many quality Christmas events on the community calendar in December.
The Calimesa Community Concert Series, in its 32nd year, has tickets for sale online for three Christmas concert performances Dec. 15 and 16. The 55-voice Gary Bonner Singers will be featured with a full orchestra at the Calimesa Seventh-day Adventist Church.
This year’s concert, titled “Christmas Joy,” is a return engagement for the musicians. Dr. Bob Soderblom, director of the concert series, says the popular Bonner groups have made repeated sell-out appearances in Calimesa over two decades, most recently in 2015.
Once again, this year’s concert will be directed by Dr. Gary Bonner, internationally recognized as a musician and leader in advancing Christian choral music performance.
He was the founding dean of the schools of music, first at Azusa Pacific University and later at California Baptist University, where he was honored as the university’s outstanding professor. He retired from CBU in 2012.
Bonner launched the Gary Bonner Singers in 1995. Acclaimed for their “musical versatility, sparkling performance, and warm, vibrant choral tone,” they have completed 21 recordings. The ensemble’s most recent album, Legacy Christmas in Concert, is the live recording of a previous Christmas concert.
A 28-piece orchestra will accompany the singers in all three Calimesa performances.
This year’s concerts are at 6 p.m. Friday, Dec.15, and again at 4 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 16. Tickets at $10, $15, and $20, depending on location, have been available online since Nov. 1 at www.iTickets.com or by phone at (800) 965-9324, Soderblom says. Good reserved seating is still available, he notes, and popular credit cards are accepted.
No tickets will be sold at the door.
All three local concert appearances are at the Calimesa Seventh-day Adventist Church, 391 Myrtlewood Dr. (4th and Myrtlewood) in Calimesa. The church is chosen to host the community concerts each Christmas partly because of its long tradition of beautiful lighting and decoration to mark the religious holiday, Soderblom explains.
“Earliest ticket orders have the best choice of reserved seating at any of the three concerts,” he adds. A dedicated telephone line provides recorded information and directions for the concert at (909) 795-4960.