Instrument: Hautbois d'amore

Like most performing arts organizations have already done, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra have realized that classical music is not tremendously popular among young people.

When Cleveland Orchestra music director Franz Welser-Möst had to bow out of this past weekend’s performances of Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana due to a recent back injury, the orchestra’s talented young assistant conductor, James Feddeck, inherited a high-profile assignment. The set of four concerts had been heavily promoted and were sold out.

Seasonal concert programmes come in all shapes and sizes. Reflecting the many sides of Christmas, they range from the commercial to the spiritual, from bombastic celebrity endorsement to the simplicity of choristers by candlelight.