 First question, which songs did you choose for your ensemble and why? Scott Hines, my assistant director and I came up with these two songs. The first one was Imagine This Season. It's an arrangement by Nat Zagrie, who is related to Steve Zagrie, great jazz educator and arranger. The second song we chose is called See Amid The Winter Snow. It's a Dan Forest arrangement and it really kind of in a very broad sense speaks to the journey, the message of the Christmas journey. And for the location, it was a really perfect song for that. It has a very choral sound to it. It's a beautiful piece, beautiful arrangement. So you mentioned the location. Which locations did you pick for your selections? We chose to do ours at the Purdue Horticulture Park. Both of the songs kind of blended themselves there. The first one's a little more light and fun. The second location was more down into the wooded area and we specifically picked that location because of the time of day in which we were going to be performing. Kind of the somberness of the outdoor kind of forest setting really made for a beautiful look for that song. I am doing a song that I really love, The Man with the Bag. Everybody's waiting for The Man with the Bag. It's a classic song, but one of my favorite pop artists, Jesse Jay, came out with the Christmas album a few years ago. And it's all big band, jazz, great arrangements. And so I sort of took her version and made a choir version of that. And I did it for really two big reasons. One, I think the Christmas show needs some tap dancing. And this number has a great instrumental feature in the middle of it, which I just thought screamed tap dance. And that instrumental feature is another reason we have like the best orchestra ever for this. I hear a lot of audience members say, wow, it sounds like a professional Broadway orchestra. And that's because it is. And so I love choosing music that lets them just do what they do best. And it's play loud, play fun, play fast, play energetically. PMO Express has traditionally had some pretty high-energy choreography. So obviously I want to showcase that and picking the song or songs that work with that. So this year, I found a really great old Mac Huff medley that had some up tempo tunes that lent itself well to the choreography that we were able to do. It doesn't get much better than Havne. So, you know, we've got the layers built in. So we've got risers already happening. Just a beautiful iconic backdrop for Purdue University. Going through the files, I found actually an old arrangement that Germaine Hill had done of Rock and Roll Christmas. I knew that in our shortened rehearsal times that it would be an easy learn and yet still be a lot of fun and kind of through the choreography show off a little bit of their athleticism as well. I was thinking, what's iconic? What is what's a what's just something that's going to be recognized immediately on film as, oh, they're there. And I don't think anything screams more. I know exactly where they're at than Rossaid Stadium, right? So luckily working with athletics, they were able to let us in and do a little do a little song and dance, which which is kind of funny. But yeah, so Rossaid was just kind of a blessing to get and we were able to to get in there and show that beautiful field and have a little Christmas in there. Well, for the pretty wets, I'm always trying to choose something where there's an opportunity to create beauty and then an opportunity to have fun. So I'll be home for Christmas is one of my favorite ballad tunes for Christmas, since no one else had claimed that I thought this is a perfect opportunity. The arranger, her name is Julie Galky and she's another Wisconsinite. So you've got Jake and Jeff, of course, Bill, and the arranger, Julie, all from Wisconsin. So it's Team Wisconsin for all your home for Christmas. And that's like, you know, me going home for Christmas. So in the other tune, we did several years back was called Go Tell It on the Mountain. And it's it's just a fun, jazzy tune. The band is featured in it. They sound great. You don't really need choreography to make it work. And it's really fun to learn and rehearse. And it certainly was fun to perform and record. So one of the hallmarks of University Choir is really refined sound, really good intonation, balance between voice parts. So I picked The Winter's Night. And there's just an opportunity to create some really flowing phrases, nice pulling sustained line. And it's just a beautiful, simple song about snow. With the University Choir, and you're dealing with close to 100 singers, you want to go anywhere on campus that you can put 100 people six feet apart. So we ended up doing the steps of Havdi, because you have the opportunity to stand in a nice straight rose with everybody visible, which is it's just a no-brainer. But then for that second song, and the other selection is just it's like a giant party. It's an arrangement done in the style of Pentatonix and it's Oh Come All You Faithful. It features soloist Hosley Warner. And it's just a giant party that invites everybody to come and have fun with us. We took all the staging charts that I had crafted using satellite photos. I spent days on these through them in the trash. And we created a new formation where the students and we did it on the spot. Jake and I had a rope. It had six feet marked off. And it ended up being a spot that worked well enough where you could see everybody. We've got some nice Purdue Hallmark iconic buildings. You know, you can see the Bell Tower and you can see Havdi and you've got them in that location as well. I chose Put A Little Love In Your Heart and your holiday song for heart and soul. Put A Little Love In Your Heart is in the Christmas movie Scrooge, which stars Bill Murray. And I really liked the message of that song and the lyrics, so I thought that would be a perfect fit for heart and soul. And then I chose your holiday song and that's a piece that was recorded by the Indigo Girls. I really liked the opening riff and I could just hear the bass player playing that in my mind as I was listening to the music. And I liked the lyrics except for a few of them and we changed those a little bit so that they would line up more with the beliefs of the singers so that it's more inclusive. For Purdue Bells, I chose a piece called Gavdate by Michael Glaskow and then the other piece is called Christmas Fantasia by Jason Crube. Both composers are pretty well known by the students in the ensemble, so that was one plus. And then the Christmas Fantasia piece is just beauty. It's just a really beautiful setting of several different Christmas carols woven together, very artfully by the composer. And I thought the audience would just love that piece, so that's why I chose it. So as you were coming up with your song choice, was there a message that you were hoping that the music would convey? Fun. Fun. Truly. Easy. Truly, yes. Because it's been such a strange year. It's been such a strange semester that I just really, I hope that they were able to just release some of the stress and sing and dance their way out of some of the confines that COVID-19 has brought to us. Now thinking about the entire process of this year's Christmas show, from choosing your songs all the way up to rapping, filming, or even, you know, this lovely interview today, what was your favorite part? My favorite thing about the whole process was the day that we did the video recording with each ensemble. And in the case of purduettes, some of our staff members had been working diligently for months to create new costumes for the purduettes. So not only am I seeing a lot of these women's faces for the first time, I'm seeing their outfits for the first time, I'm seeing them look similar, I'm seeing them be excited about their outfits, and this is all happening in like a two hour window. So that was my favorite thing. And similarly for University Choir, they didn't have new outfits. But again, this was the first time I'd seen some of these people. We have people from like 15, 18 states in that group, and I've never had a face-to-face conversation with them. They just, their performance level was just so fantastic. So yeah, my favorite thing about the whole process definitely the day we got to record the video. What some of the challenges were that your ensemble had to overcome from learning the music all the way through the recording process. Sure. So one big hurdle we had is that we rehearsed outside on the lawn in front of Bailey Hall. And if you're not familiar with where that is, it's on the corner of Northwestern and Grant Street. But just across the street from us was this massive engineering project going on that had begun late in the summer and it continued on throughout the semester. So we were always battling the possibility of there being this loud noise as we didn't know if it would be trucks backing up in the beeping or they'd be banging from jack cameras. And on the other side, there was an old house that was demolished with a large bulldozer. And now try singing, everybody's waiting for the men. So that was a really hard thing to do. Social distancing made it hard for the students to hear one another. And then when you compound that with a mask and a face shield on the top of that, it really was just kind of crazy. Some days I just felt like it was a total miracle that we all got together for 50 minutes and we were actually able to do something. But everything from horrible exhaust systems to airplanes flying overhead to the beautiful, I'm sure it's going to be beautiful, building right across the street. Just listening was a real challenge. Initially, before we even had our Bluetooth packs, we were just outside and I didn't even realize they were singing. And I thought this is going to be a nightmare. And then around the second week, of course, we got those devices that allow each student and each director to hear the piano, to hear the director voice, to hear the ambient sound under the tent. And at that point, we suddenly appreciated what we had. We could tell they were singing and we could tell if they were singing in tune or not. So I mean, it's incredible how our students were able to focus through all of those distractions, just to be able to practice themselves. And then moving through the rehearsal process to the video recording, this is the first time, of course, any of the students had to stand in any sort of formation with posture and look like anything other than a person wearing a mask. So, of course, as a staff member, you have both fingers double crossed behind your back, hoping it all works out. For the full choir with the glare from the sun, I mean, when we scoped out the place then the afternoon, it was later in the afternoon, so the sun wasn't shining where it needed to be, so we just didn't even consider that that would be an obstacle. So that was a problem. I just remembered another one, too. Remember the robots? Oh, yes! They kept coming through and the kids would have to like redirect them and pick them up and move them. Oh, my gosh. They have the food robot, you know. Yeah, the Starship. Yeah, Starship. We go by Scott's specialty show. Yeah. Cut right through the specialty show. Those robots were all about our filming this year. They were. They were everywhere. Probably nerve wracking, but it definitely paid off. A little nerve wracking, and then we were so lucky to be able to do Ross Aid. In a huge place like Ross Aid, you would think we'd have all the space in the world, but as you know, we didn't. So that, you know, when we have the bigger group and you have less space, it kind of creates a little bit of an issue. And for our specialty group, OTT, they filmed on the north side of Elliott Hall, but the morning of the shoot, it was nine o'clock in the morning and it was 20 degrees and it was really, really cold and the bells, even the pitch of the bell changed as they rang, but it was a real challenge that morning to film and a dumps truck or garbage truck was by doing its little beeping and it was just a very interesting shoot. Very good. And this, and you could even watch, like with the University Choir specifically, you could see from that first take through whatever the 27th take, they just kept getting better and better. They started to figure out what was going on and their energy level would go up and Gary would say, why don't we do another one? And Gary was getting excited, our videographer. And then just the specter of thinking, are we even going to make it to November? That was always in the back of our mind. We're practicing very hard, putting in lots of hours of rehearsals. We were just hoping and praying that we wouldn't have a surge in cases on campus and we'd have to shut down and revert to a virtual only option, but thankfully we were able to make it and everybody did a great job. As I always say, these students are just, they're just amazing and they rise to any challenge that gets thrown at them and I'm really proud of what they accomplished this year. Absolutely. Bill, you've mentioned that the PMO staff had to take some unique steps to make this possible, so here's maybe kind of a unique question. If you could pick any Purdue icon past or present to make a cameo appearance in the Christmas show, who would that be? That was a great question and it took me a while to kind of think through, I would pick Ralph Bailey. Sorry, Ralph is someone who was very special to me and he passed away a few years ago and if there was anyone that I would think would be incredibly proud of what we did this year, Ralph was one of them. When we were struggling to figure out how we were going to build that beautiful building, Bailey Hall, he always was encouraging, never ever wavered in his strength and thinking that this was going to happen. In fact, he told me failure is not an option, right? And I think this year he would say the same thing, no matter what has been thrown at you, no matter how trying and scary this whole process is, have faith, things will work out and the resiliency of your staff and your students is really going to shine through. So I really would love to have Ralph be here to see and be a part of this process. I think he'd be really proud of us. And modifications that you had to make for this virtual Christmas show, are there any modifications that you made this year that you think would actually be beneficial to carry through for future Christmas shows, either virtually or in person? 100%, one, every show needs tap dancing. It could be a warm or cold Wednesday evening and students could have had exams or virtual lecture after virtual lecture, but when it came to tap dance practice, people were just smiling for the entire 30 minutes that we would do it. It was some of the most fun. And I don't know a thing about it. I won't lie, I didn't choreograph it. I can't do it. We had two amazing students choreograph it, Rachel and Brian. But man, if I can incorporate some more of that energy into a show in the future, whether virtual or in person, I would absolutely love to. And our students are so talented. Additionally, we haven't really done this thing we did with the pruduettes, where we took that we have three different specialty groups, a group of three, a group of four, and a group of six. But for this show, we decided to combine them to a group of 13. So just having that weekly rehearsal with those 13 students was a really fun way to explore talent and creativity and innovation and new ideas and kind of stretching the voice to see what we can create. So I'm going to do that even in non-Christmas semesters, which surprisingly exist. Sometimes it doesn't feel like it, but they do. So even in the spring semester, we'll continue doing like a pruduit specialties number and a group rehearsal where we can get together and share our talents. Is there anything else you want to share with the audience? I just like to show what's possible with the instrument, with the bell instrument. A lot of people don't know. I mean, they think that we stand outside of Kmart or Kroger at Christmas time and ring the bell. And to them that is bell ringing. And so for them to actually see a choir and actually play music, it's just really, wow, a wow moment for them. So that's why I like to try and plan as far of a broad spectrum of music when I select. I do remember the day we filmed the bells on campus and there was a crowd of students that just gathered. Not the ones who were walking by on their phone, but just walking to watch. You know, it had been so long since they probably saw live music on campus and I think they applauded afterwards. It was kind of like a mini performance for them. Being someone that has not only a directorial responsibility with an ensemble, but overseeing the entire organization, I just want our audience to know that what it really did bring out for me is how truly that Boilermaker spirit that President Daniel speaks about of no matter what the challenge, we will figure it out. No matter what the setbacks, we will work around them, we will find ways to succeed. And this project to me was from the start, everyone's participation, everyone's selflessness in this process really shown through. And when things are all stripped away and the public performances and the really the glitz and the lights go away, what's left is truly the pride in what you're doing and how you connect with the individual. If watching the show gives you energy, if it makes you feel good, if you smile and want to watch it again, the biggest thing I can say is once we get over the COVID hump, join a choir, get in your own Christmas concert, sing carols with your family, teach new songs to your kids, just keep singing. I hear people that say singing is not for me and the secret is that's totally okay because we need people to show up too. So if singing isn't your thing, pay to go to a live show, pay to go see a show at your local community theater, make a donation to your local community choir, get involved in live art because we're going to need help when it comes time to put audience back in these beautiful houses that we have, we're going to need the help. And students, they need music in their lives to survive emotionally and mentally. These students that have been blessed with voices and have been blessed with these ears and just blessed with the gift of musicianship, they need to be able to do that for their health and we're giving them that opportunity. And to be able to put this into a production that we can then push out, they're taking those gifts and they're sharing them with others who need to hear them just as much as they need to sing. Just the fact that we were able to get together and sing and share music and share some laughs behind the face shields and the plexiglass, I think is just incredible. I think it's incredible. I think the fact that they showed up all the time, their attitudes were amazing, their stamina, their determination to learn a new way to sing, to learn a new way to listen, to learn a new way to celebrate was really just really fascinating to watch, but at the same time really just a beautiful experience. And I'm so incredibly proud of our staff. I mean you all have just been amazing and our students coming through and making this project one that I think everyone will be proud of.