Orchestra will hold its annual winter concert Dec. 8 at 7 p.m. At the concert, all four orchestra groups – concert, symphonic, philharmonic and chamber – will be playing holiday and mixed theme music.

“Personally, I can’t do a pure Christmas concert,” orchestra director Matthew Cautivar said. “I have to mix it up. We’re playing some non-holiday music, but some music related to this time of year. One of our orchestras is playing the soundtrack to Black Panther, which isn’t really winter related, but the sequel came out recently, so [we’re] throwing that in there.”

The winter concert will be the orchestra’s second concert of the year, and it will be the school’s first ever concert with all four groups, including the newly-formed philharmonic orchestra.

“I am really happy that we have so many students in our orchestra,” senior cello section leader Madeline Chong said. “We had so many students that we made [the] new orchestra. I think it’s just made our program a lot more full and active, and it’s really made our winter concert shine even more.”

The concert serves as a checkpoint for the orchestra as it’s the second of four concerts it has throughout the year, and the first allotting a selection for every class to play.

“I’ve been in an orchestra ever since I was in sixth grade,” senior viola player Caitlyn Nguyen said. “The winter concert is one of my favorite concerts because we play a lot of fun music, and it’s really exciting to see what each of our groups are playing.”

The concert program includes holiday classics like “Greensleeves,” “Carol of the Bells,” “We Three Kings” and a set of Trans-Siberian orchestra pieces.

“[Though the music pieces vary in theme], a lot of the pieces are more on the Christmas side this year,” Chong said. “Last year, we did a lot of more serious songs, but this year, it’s more of us showing holiday spirit, and I think that’s amazing.”

As the orchestra closes 2022 with the winter concert, it will transition into UIL season directly after.

“We have four major concerts in the year,” Cautivar said. “The second one really is a celebration and capstone of everything we did the first semester. It’s also to set us up for the next semester. It’s a concert in its own right; it’s a celebration of the holiday season, but then we’re also setting up for next semester.”