The holiday spirit got an oomph – or rather, an oompah – at this year’s Tuba Christmas event in downtown Naperville.
“Tuba Christmas is an annual concert that we hold here in front of the U.S. Bank every year,” said David Carroll, coordinator of Naperville’s Tuba Christmas. “This year is our 45th anniversary.”
More than 80 tuba and euphonium players came together to play about 16 Christmas carols to a welcoming crowd, who were encouraged to sing along.
The beginnings of Tuba Christmas
This holiday concert isn’t just a Naperville tradition. The original Tuba Christmas got its start in 1974 at the Rockefeller Plaza ice rink in New York City.
“The concert was held by a tuba player named Harvey Phillips in honor of his teacher, Bill Bell, who was born on Christmas Day,” said Carroll.
That started snowballing into a number of Tuba Christmas concerts throughout the nation. Now Naperville is one of 348 locations that have made the event an annual holiday tradition, including cities in all 52 U.S. states plus Australia and Canada.
“You’ll never see that snowball go back down the mountain,” said Thomas Phillips, Harvey’s son. “It’s because of the mass of different tuba players all over the region that have never played before in a concert that sounds like they’ve been playing for years. It’s a miracle.”
Naperville’s take on the seasonal concert
Here in Naperville, another tuba player, the late Ron Keller, longtime Naperville Municipal Band director, was instrumental in launching the local installment.
“Ron started Tuba Christmas back in 1979, and he continued to conduct it all the way up until 2019,” said Carroll. “We really do appreciate everything that he’s done for us because he’s been such an important part of the music here in the city of Naperville.”
Uniting musicians of all ages
The concert unites musicians both young and old to bring holiday cheer with a bit of brass. Carroll said this year’s group ranged in age from 10 to 70 plus. Whatever the age, they all needed to be sharp, as the practice time was just a quick hour before the actual concert.
“We just rehearse them one time through and that’s all we get,” said Carroll. “Tuba Christmas is one of those rare events where you can sit side by side with somebody that you don’t know who’s totally different than you. Yet we come together in the same language of music and to be able to create these beautiful sounds that only the tuba and euphonium can create.”
A holiday favorite
The annual performance has become a favorite event for many, starting the holiday season on just the right note.
It’s free for the audience, but the performers do pay a registration fee. Those proceeds go to the Harvey Phillips Foundation, a nonprofit focused on “developing, expanding, and preserving the music arts,” according to the event’s website.
“It’s a very unique, sonorous, beautiful, resonant sound that, you just can’t get anywhere else. So that’s one of the things that makes Tuba Christmas so special,” said Carroll. “To be able to bring that event to the players and to the audience members is something that we cherish and we hope to continue.”
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