Paul Winter’s Winter Solstice Celebration Tour in the Northeast

Paul Winter’s
Winter Solstice Celebration
Lebanon Opera House, Lebanon, New Hampshire
December 16, 2024
The Flynn, Burlington, Vermont
December 17, 2024

Burlington, VT:  Seven-time Grammy®-winning saxophonist Paul Winter and the Paul Winter Consort will bring their Winter Solstice Celebration across New England this December, with performances in Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut, and Vermont, with a concert at 7:00 pm on Monday, December 16th at the Lebanon Opera House, in Lebanon, NH and 7.30pm on Tuesday, December 17 at The Flynn in Burlington.

For decades, the Paul Winter Consort presented their Winter Solstice Celebration in the world’s largest Cathedral, New York’s St. John the Divine, where it was beloved as New York’s holiday alternative to The Nutcracker and Radio City’s Christmas Spectacular. Since the pandemic, the event has not taken place in New York, and the Consort is now bringing it to the finest acoustic halls in New England in a ten-venue tour.

The Consort includes Paul Winter, soprano sax; Eugene Friesen, cello; Brazilian pianist Henrique Eisenmann; Bulgarian bassist Peter Slavov; Brazilian drummer Rogerio Boccato; and the beloved voice of Theresa Thomason.

“Central to all the traditions of solstice is the renewal of spirit,” Paul notes, “symbolized by the rebirth of the sun. Winter solstice is a time for healing and hope; it is a time to celebrate community and relatedness; and a time to honor the diversity and the unity of the great cornucopia of life on Earth. Remembering the solstice, we resonate once again with the rhythm of the cosmos and allow our hearts to embrace the optimism of our ancient knowledge that the light will overcome the darkness.”

The Winter Solstice Celebration is a contemporary take on ancient solstice rituals, when people felt a calling to come together on the longest night of the year, to welcome the return of the Sun and birth of the new year. One of the earliest exponents of world music, Winter and his group the Paul Winter Consort also pioneered a new genre of “earth music,” interweaving classical, jazz, and world music elements with voices from what Winter calls “the greater symphony of the earth,” helping connect listeners to a sense of place and to the larger community of life. This tour is an opportunity to raise awareness for the important work happening to protect, nurture, and regenerate the landscape across the Northeast USA.

Trees and forests have long formed part of Solstice celebrations around the world, so the winter solstice event is an occasion to connect with some of the organizations in the Northeast working to study and conserve forests. Here in New England, we are blessed with spectacular forests. But what if our forests were only a fraction of what they could be? The more we learn about our forests, the more we realize how extraordinary they are, but also how much we don’t know.

Scientists increasingly agree that the older a forest grows, the healthier and more resilient it becomes, and the more carbon it sequesters. If forest age is our measuring stick, however, we have a long way to go. Less than one-tenth of one percent of Vermont forests are old-growth, or forests that have escaped logging since European colonization. Equally tragic, only 3% of our forests are managed so that they might someday grow old.

“Each and every solstice, as our hemisphere gradually tilts back towards the light, we celebrate and honor the sun’s rebirth, and the incredible resilience of life on our home planet,” commented  Zack Porter, Executive Director of Standing Trees. “Today, we give special thanks for the resilience of Vermont’s forests against incredible odds, and redouble our commitment to their health and wellbeing, so that future generations may know a forest that we can only imagine.” For more information on Vermont’s forests, and what you can do to help them grow old, contact: Zack Porter, Standing Trees, zp*****@st***********.org.

Jamison Ervin, Vermont resident and international forest conservation specialist, says “Paul Winter’s haunting song, ‘The Well-Tempered Wood Thrush,’ evokes the very voice of New England forests — a melody born of old trees, unbroken glades, and quiet sanctuaries. Through his music, Winter invites us to pause and reflect on the natural world: what we’ve lost, what remains, and the beauty we stand to restore by safeguarding these irreplaceable old forests.”

“In this time of cascading environmental collapse, keeping our ecological lifelines intact is a priority,” explains Keetu Winter, Executive Director of Connecticut-based Wellspring Commons. “In New England, we are facing significant decisions about our relationship to forests, which provide high quality water, protect us from flooding, sequester carbon, and are home to biodiversity and wildlife – will we finally allow some of our forests to grow old for the first time in hundreds of years, or will we continue to destroy and degrade them?”

The Paul Winter Consort would like to thank the following organizations for their tireless work studying, educating, and protecting the forests of the Northeast:

Standing Trees: To overcome the climate and extinction crises, Standing Trees envisions a future where New England’s federal and state public lands are managed to restore the natural, old-growth forests that evolved over millennia alongside the region’s indigenous people. Founded in 2020, Standing Trees is a community of forest lovers and wildlands advocates who are dedicated to advancing policy and legal solutions that protect and restore New England’s native forests. Standing Trees serves as a watchdog for state and federal agencies and ensures that land managers and policymakers follow the latest climate and biodiversity science. Visit www.standingtrees.org to learn more.

Vermont River Conservancy: Vermont River Conservancy protects and restores rivers for people and wildlife. The Vermont River Conservancy protects floodplains, wetlands, and headwater forests, allowing rivers to flow freely on undeveloped land, storing water during times of droughts and floods, and maximizing carbon storage. The Vermont River Conservancy restores rivers’ connectivity through floodplain restorations and dam removals, creating space for rivers to regularly flood, slow, and filter pollutants, and supporting a rich mosaic of connected habitats for fish and wildlife. The Vermont River Conservancy works with communities to secure access to rivers for swimming, paddling, fishing, and walking, helping to close nature gaps and achieve more equitable access to rivers. Learn more at www.vermontriverconservancy.org.

The Rewilding Institute: The Rewilding Institute (TRI) works for a much wilder Earth.  TRI hosts Rewilding Earth, a website for all things rewilding, and advocates for protection and restoration of the full range of native wildlife across North America and beyond. In particular, The Rewilding Institute advocates for Cougar recovery in the Northeast, and Wolf and Jaguar recovery in the Southwest. We see symbolic Catamounts (Cougars) all over the University of Vermont campus; we want to see the real cats in our region’s forests! Learn more at  www.rewilding.org.

Vermont Reptile and Amphibian Atlas: The Vermont Reptile and Amphibian Atlas is an effort begun in 1994 by the Reptile and Amphibian Scientific Advisory Group for the Vermont Endangered Species Committee. Data were needed in order to make informed recommendations regarding the appropriate status and conservation of our frogs, salamanders, snakes, turtles, and one lizard. Since then, our goals have widened to incorporate education, citizen involvement, and dissemination of information. The Vermont Reptile and Amphibian Atlas is continuing to collect information and broaden our knowledge base regarding the natural history, distribution, and effective conservation of Vermont’s reptiles and amphibians. Learn more at www.VtHerpAtlas.org.

Northeast Wilderness Trust: Northeast Wilderness Trust conserves forever-wild landscapes and it envisions a landscape of connected, resilient wildlands shared by a human culture that recognizes the benefits of wild places. It accomplishes this work by acquiring land and holding forever-wild conservation easements on properties owned by other organizations or individuals. Northeast Wilderness Trust also champions the wilderness idea in the public sphere. Across New England and New York, the Wilderness Trust secures wild places where Nature can thrive, wildlife can wander, and people can find beauty and quiet. Today, Northeast Wilderness Trust safeguards 80,000 forever-wild acres, including over 22,000 right here in Vermont. Learn more at www.newildernesstrust.org.

Keeping Track: Keeping Track is a non-profit organization founded in 1994 by Susan C. Morse, a nationally known naturalist, out of her concern that development in all its forms often unwittingly harms, isolates, and even eliminates habitat critical to local biodiversity and broad-scale ecological health. Compounding the problem, many of those responsible for protecting habitat lack the resources needed to “keep track” of the status of wildlife and habitat in their assigned areas. Keeping Track is founded on the belief that more “boots on the ground” field research is essential to successfully conserve an appropriate matrix of core and connective habitats. Adult and youth training programs are designed to both inspire community volunteers as well as turn them into practitioners of a science-based field study methodology. Learn more at www.keepingtrack.org.

This concert is part of a Winter Solstice tour, including performances in New Haven, CT, on December 19; Great Barrington, MA, on December 21; Worcester, MA on December 22; Troy, NY, on December 27; and Northampton, MA, on December 28. For more information on these and other performances, visit: paulwinter.com

For decades, the music of Paul Winter’s Winter Solstice Celebrations in New York were broadcast nationwide on NPR. Solstice Saga, the epic retrospective video from the first 40 years of the Winter Solstice Celebration at the Cathedral, is available on YouTube.

The album Everybody Under The Sun is available on all streaming platforms and for digital and physical purchase. Everybody Under The Sun is a 30-track collection featuring The Paul Winter Consort with guest artists from around the world over four decades of these Solstice celebrations.

From the early days of his college jazz sextet, which toured 23 countries of Latin America for the State Department and performed the first-ever jazz concert at the White House for the Kennedys in 1962, to his later ensemble, the Paul Winter Consort, Paul Winter’s concert tours and recording expeditions have taken him to 52 countries and to wilderness areas on six continents, where he has traveled on rafts, dog sleds, mules, kayaks, tugboats and Land Rovers. He has recorded over 50 albums, of which seven have been honored with Grammy® Awards.

Visit Paul Winter’s website HERE
Visit the Solstice Celebrations website HERE
Paul Winter on Facebook
Paul Winter on Instagram

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WHAT: Paul Winter’s Winter Solstice Celebration

WHERE: Lebanon Opera House, 51 N Park St, Lebanon, NH 03766
WHEN:  Monday, December 16 at 7pm
TICKETS: On sale via the Lebanon Opera House website or call 603-448-0400.

WHERE: The Flynn, 153 Main St, Burlington, VT 05401
WHEN:  Tuesday, December 17 at 7:30pm
TICKETS: On sale via The Flynn website or call 802-863-5966.

Tickets are now on sale. More information about Paul Winter’s Winter Solstice Celebration Tour is available at solsticeconcert.com.