Northern Sky’s 10 years of Christmas cheer

GreenBay-Unknown

It’s been a tradition for the past 10 years. Northern Sky Theater rolls out its annual Christmas show — the day after Christmas.

Holly Feldman and Doc Heide rehearse a song for Northern Sky Theater’s “Home for the Holidays.”

“Some people may wonder why we do that,” said “Home for the Holidays” performer Holly Feldman, who is also the company’s development director.

It turns out there’s a very good reason for the holiday delay.

The idea originated a decade ago when the company’s general manager at the time, Kaye Christman, thought it would be nice to put on a holiday show, explained Feldman.

The days leading up to Christmas are always hectic and packed, however, so didn’t make sense to add one more thing to the mix.

“And, (Christman) always thought you crashed into Christmas Day, then it was all over,” said Feldman remembering the inspiration, “Kaye always thought it was such a letdown on Dec. 26.

“So, she came up with this idea to carry the good will over to the following week” when people generally had more time to enjoy a show, Feldman said.

Christman’s brainchild became “Home for the Holidays.”

Every year, the Christmas show features a mix of different performers associated with Northern Sky. This year sees the return of the trio of Frederick “Doc” Heide, Feldman and Eric Lewis, who played the holiday shows in 2010.

Heide has been with the theater group since its earliest incarnation, the Heritage Ensemble, and was a founding member of American Folklore Theatre, an offshoot of the ensemble. In 2015 the company changed its name to Northern Sky.

Heide’s 40-plus years with the company are a testament to his popularity as an artist and performer. He has written or co-written many popular shows for the company, including “Guys and Does,” “Belgians in Heaven” and “Packer Fans from Outer Space.”

And his songwriting is legendary among his many fans.

This year, he’ll roll out four new songs he wrote for “Home for the Holidays,” two funny and two serious. Among the serious carols he wrote is “Follow that Star,” a song that considers the wise men from their perspective.

Heide, a professor at the prestigious California School of Professional Psychology at Alliant International University in San Francisco, is currently on sabbatical. Over the fall, he spent time researching obscure Christmas carols and also the wise men, digging deep into the historical information.

“The Christmas story is so rich,” said Heide, “and we take a lot of it for granted.”

Take the wise men, for instance, and their trek to follow the star.

“It was no small thing at all,” said Heide. “The best scholarship says the wise men lived in Persia or Yemen. That’s 1,300, 1,700 miles away from Bethlehem, across desert waste. On the back of a camel. Clearly, they didn’t automaticaly decide to do this ... and they were doing it based on a star. It was probaby a big decision.”

In addition to the songs he wrote, Heide also researched and discovered several obscure Christmas carols for the show.

”I’m not at all into ‘Frosty the Snowman,’” said Heide, who said he prefers traditional and folk carols.

One of the little-known carols Heide discovered for this show is an African-American song called “Poor Little Jesus.”

“We can get (Lewis) to blaze out on guitar on that one,” said Heide.

“We have another from John Jacob Niles, a famous folklorist from Kentucky, from before World War I. It’s called ‘Jesus, Jesus, Rest Your Head.’ It has a peculiar line in it that we debated taking out. But in the end, we left it in — ‘All the evil folk on Earth sleep on feathers at their birth.’“

The line was in regards to Jesus’s birth in a barn, Heide said, and also a nod to the historical mindset when the song was written.

Lewis an important part

Lewis is a string instrumentalist and national recording artist from Memphis who became associated with the theater in the ‘90s.

“Eric, he’s a huge part of the draw,” Heide said. “We’ve tried to get him back, repeatedly. But it’s very hard to get him here. He’s the hardest working man in show biz.”

“He loves doing the show and loves being here,” Heide added. “Eric is just such a fountain of light. It’s such a profound honor to work with him. He’s both a phenomenal musician and also a deeply kind, generous, empathic, ebullient individual. I feel completely relaxed working with Holly and Eric. If anything goes off the rails, it will be OK.”

Eric Lewis, Doc Heide and Holly Feldman, from left, are seen during a “Home for the Holidays” show in 2010. The three Northern Sky Theater veterans reunite for this year’s run of five “Home for the Holidays” performances.

Feldman echoed Heide’s enthusiasm.

“Eric can hear things in the sound that aren’t quite right, and correct them. He adds that next level,” she said.

Lewis’ schedule doesn’t allow him to arrive in Door County until shortly before the first show, but that doesn’t worry Heide or Feldman. Lewis has the material and is practicing pieces on his own and over the phone.

In the meanwhile, Feldman and Heide are busy rehearsing and creating the show together, a process that is less spit-and-polish and more organic.

That suits Heide’s style of performance. It’s more of a conversation with the audience, he said.

Feels like Heritage days

Feldman and Heide joked that the holiday show is just a tiny part of the Northern Sky’s annual budget.

“It makes money, I guess,” Heide said. “But that’s not why we do it.”

In fact, Feldman admitted, when the company is in the throes of a busy summer and autumn season, the holiday show is relegated the back burner until October.

“But ... that’s kind of the charm of it,” Feldman said.

It always comes together.

And, said Heide, “it’s fresh. The really great thing about this is, it’s new every night. It’s spontaneous — well, not really, we’ve rehearsed it — but it’s fresh because you are talking to the audience. And that’s super fun. There’s no question this is what I’d prefer to do.”

That’s because the creation of the show harkens back to Heide’s Heritage Ensemble days, when shows were developed and rehearsed by the cast in a short time period before the first performance.

That approach appeals to Heide and the audiences he performed for. Indeed, fans still remember and relish those old shows.

Feldman agreed the holiday show feels a lot like the old days.

“It’s part of our mission,” she said. “Fans often ask that we bring a concert show back, but it isn’t really viable on the summer stage, especially these days when there are so many music options in the summer, including free outdoor concerts in every community.”

So, even though “Home for the Holidays” aims to appeal to anyone looking for a little Christmas cheer, the annual show is also a nod to the company’s rich past and an offering to longtime fans.

Still, it’s all a little nontraditional, compared to the way other professional theater troupes operate.

For example, while Feldman is the company’s development director, she has been referred to in the past as the company’s “secret weapon.”

That’s because she has a musical theater education degree from the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point. When she was 19, she auditioned for American Folklore Theatre and was asked to sing ‘White Bird’ with directors Fred Alley and Jeff Herbst in the room and perform a scene with company actor and musician Chris Irwin, “all gentlemen I idolized as a child,” she said.

“Although I didn’t get cast that year, and ultimately changed my major to arts management, my minor in theater and background in performance were always brimming just below the surface, waiting for an opportunity to be useful in some way, shape or form,” Feldman said.

Feldman has performed in concert shows with many of the company’s regulars and was a “Home for the Holidays” cast member in 2009 as well as 2010.

“It’s fun for me,” said Feldman. “And I think it’s nice for the audience, too. While I relish my position in the daily life of Northern Sky, I also relish getting the chance to sing. ‘The office girl can sing!’”

Pragmatically, it helps develop a more intimate relationship with donors to the company, Feldman said. But, she said, it’s much more than that.

“I get to fulfill that artistic side of me. I don’t always get to exercise that part of my brain,” she said.

“I love that we are that kind of theater where we can do that,” Heide added.

 

• FYI

Northern Sky Theater presents “Home for the Holidays” with Eric Lewis, Doc Heide and Holly Feldman at 4 p.m. Dec. 27 through 31 at Old Gibraltar Town Hall, 4176 Maple St. (Spruce and Maple streets), Fish Creek. General admission tickets are $23 for ages 13 and older, $13 ages 12 and younger; the Dec. 31 show is sold out. Each show offers a prize drawing for local gift certificates.

For advance tickets or more information, visit the Northern Sky box office, in the Shops of Green Gables, 10351 Wisconsin 42, Ephraim; call 920-854-6117; or go to www.northernskytheater.com; available seating will be sold at the door beginning 45 minutes before each performance.