There’s something that makes the holidays a perfect time to enjoy music. For some people they make music themselves, either singing out loud or playing an instrument. For some, they are content to listen to others make music — bobbing their head, humming along and smiling.

Almost everyone finds their way to music of some sort during this time of year.

People who know about musical performance and engage in music education say there’s something special about coming together as a community to appreciate or participate in music between Thanksgiving and the New Year.

LIZ LEBEAU

“Holiday music, in particular, is ritualistic and comforting,” said Liz LeBeau, the choral music director ad Middlebury Union High School. “It has a unique ability to evoke memories, often positive ones, of time spent with loved ones and the shared experience of music.”

Allison Coyne Carroll, the Performing Arts Series director for the college’s Middlebury Arts Center, points out that most of us hear a wealth of holiday music from our earliest years, so when we hear it again later in life it evokes wonderful memories and feelings of nostalgia. And getting that nostalgia fix in the presences of family and friends just deepens the experience.

“Just like gathering around the holiday table, music gives us a chance to gather and have a shared experience,” she said.

Friends and neighbors as well as other folks we may not know — people of different backgrounds — can come together for a holiday music performance and put aside division and strife, darkness or fear, said Jeff Rehbach, the longtime choir director of the Middlebury College Community Chorus who also conducts the annual Messiah Sing at the Congregational Church of Middlebury.

Coming together to share music and experience this type of balm may be particularly important this holiday season, he added.

“As we share music, that uplifts our spirits and offers a sense of hope and light and peace to all,” Rehbach said.

But this year is no different than many that have proceeded it, in that anyone who programs a public performance nowadays is naturally cognizant that the holiday season encompasses more than the Christian holiday.

Bill Bowers remembers when he was the music director at Mount Abraham Union High School a few decades ago, his holiday performances were a balance of sacred and secular music that celebrated not just the Christian holiday but also Hanukkah and Kwanza. He says Christmas has become so commercial that its meaning is gone for many. But music is a place where we can tap into the holiday’s roots.

“I believe a holiday concert should include some sacred music for its historical significance and be explained in the program notes,” Bower said. “There are some very fine classical selections of a sacred nature that could be performed without the audience ever knowing. Just get out some Bach and Handel.”

Rehbach also personally prefers holiday music from historical times, in particular Renaissance a cappella choral music that was originally composed for church settings.

“Beautiful contemporary music, coming from the classical tradition, can be heard on the concert stage as well as in services, by composers such as Morten Lauridsen, John Rutter, Ola Gjeilo and Rosephanye Powell, to name just a few,” he noted.

Other music professionals have their holiday favorites. Coyne Carroll enjoys the traditional Catalan Christmas song “El Noi de la Mare,” or “In the Bleak Midwinter,” though she acknowledges it is an awful title for the holidays. LeBeau likes the more modern — though not too modern — “Walking in a Winter Wonderland.” Sadie Brightman, executive director of the Middlebury Community Music Center, singles out her own timeless favorite, “Silent Night.”

MIDDLEBURY COMMUNITY MUSIC Center Director Sadie Brightman, a professionally trained pianist, says holiday musical performances give us a chance to pause and appreciate the beauty of what we’re doing and the connections we’re making with others.

Bowers mentioned “White Christmas,” and “Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire.” Though, he acknowledges that, like some people, he is pretty well sick of all the holiday tunes even before Dec. 26 arrives.

“It is funny how the genre feels irrelevant on Jan. 1!” Brightman said. “I’m usually ready to turn the page.”

But first, everyone has to get through the holiday season with its myriad commitments to family, job and any number of friend connections. That also applies to musicians who have to balance making holiday music and taking part in all of the other seasonal activities.

Coyne Carroll recalled that during her years in vocal performance as a soloist and choir member it was a struggle during the holidays to perform in concerts while also participating in a busy life.

“I’d always run myself down singing every weekend and end up sick with a ‘Christmas Crud,’” she said, referring to the awful combination of sore throat, runny nose and cough. “Just working a day job and attending holiday work has helped in that respect, but I do miss the joy in music making at the holidays.”

For Brightman, a noted pianist and vocalist, it’s about remembering what the season is really about.

“I try to create space to pause and appreciate the beauty of what we’re doing and the connections we’re fostering. Those quiet moments of gratitude make the busy ones feel worthwhile,” she said.

And she comes back to that aspect of a holiday concert where everyone — musician and layman alike — experience the generosity of the moment together, when there is an unspoken agreement between the performers and the audience to share in something meaningful.

“The air feels different — more charged, more tender,” Brightman said. “It’s a chance to celebrate the season’s beauty, joy and stillness all at once.

“A holiday show isn’t just a performance, it’s a shared experience.”