~ A TRUCE OF CAROLS ~
~ A TRUCE OF CAROLS ~ |
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Click on Picture or Title to hear selection |
Overture Continued |
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English Farewell |
German Farewell |
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Jonathan, newly enlisted, bids his fiancee Connie farewell as he is about to leave for the front. |
Lt. Gottlieb bids his Wife Inge farewell as he is to report for duty on the front. |
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English Trench - Christmas Eve |
English Trench - Christmas Eve |
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On Christmas Eve, a young English soldier keeps watch over no-mans land while his comrades take a much needed rest. |
Lt. Worthing wishes his men "Merry Christmas" and warns Sgt. McGrath to stay alert as there has been fraternization reported along the front - perhaps a German ploy. |
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German Trench - Christmas Eve |
German Trench - Christmas Eve |
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Small Christmas trees decorate the German trenches on Christmas Eve 1914. Most of the soldiers are hoping for a Christmas Truce. |
Guther, a medic and minister is suggesting that he might take a Christmas tree across no-man's land to give to the English, to the amusement and alarm of his comrades. |
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German Trench - Christmas Eve |
The Christmas Truce Begins |
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Gunther, aware of the dangers of crossing no-man's land sings of placing his faith in the good will of all men, especially on this "Holiest" of days. |
The English and German Lieutenants agree to a spontaneous truce on order to bury their dead. Lt. Gottlieb declares it an "honorable" custom of war and not in violation of orders. |
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Burying the Dead |
The Soccer Match |
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| The English and German's bury their dead. The English share burial crosses when the Germans run out. Gunther is checking each soldier for life-signs just in case. | After an impromtu service for the fallen, a soccer ball rolls into the scene from a game nearby. Before the officers can forbid it, most of the soldiers from both sides join the game offstage. |
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Lieutenant Worthing's Aria |
Jonathan's Aria |
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With most of the men at the soccer match, Lt. Worthing shares a pre-war story of love found and lost in Italy with his German counterpart. |
The young English soldier Jonathan recites a poem he wrote to his fiancee Connie for Lt. Gottlieb. |
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Writing Home |
Connie's Aria |
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| Lt. Worthing brings Jonathan a letter from Connie. During the scene, Jonathan and Gottlieb read the letters from home while their loved ones sing what they wrote. | Jonathan's fiancee, Connie writes Jonathan of home and how much she loves and misses him - imaging him stepping from the steam swept train platform seeing only her. h |
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Inge's Aria and Women's Duet |
Soccer Players Return |
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| Inge sings of hearing Gottlieb's footsteps in the hallway, but "there's no one there". She and Connie reprise in duet music from Connie's aria - "Then your eyes are all I see.." | The soccer players return with the Germans victorious mainly because German officers were often the refs, but Sgt. Mac managed to steal the ball. All "hail to the mighty 'Jock'," a slang term used to for Scottsmen. | ||
Christmas Dinner |
Marcus' Aria |
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| The Germans and English celebrate Christmas dinner together, the Germans providing the beer and the English Maconochie's a thin soup and Bovril, a thick, salty meat extract. | Marcus, a Prussian sniper who refuses to participate in the cease-fire sings about the futility of the Christmas Truce. "Tomorrow we will kill each other"... | ||
Lt. Worthing's Second Aria |
Return to England |
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| Lt. Worthing tells the troops of the letters being sent home all along the front describing the truce - a symbol of peace that must be remembered. | Lt. Worthing returns to England bringing the poems and letters from Jonathan who died in the war. As Connie reads Jonathan's poem, she imagines him singing it with her. | ||
Return to Germany |
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| Lt. Gottlieb returns home. | |||
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Production Photos by Robert Snedegar
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