For LCCC Civic Orchestra, it's Christmas in May

There are no surprises during a pandemic. This includes Christmas being celebrated in May, as well as an orchestra featuring only flute, clarinet and string musicians (violin, cello, bass). That's exactly how the Lorain County Community College's Civic Orchestra is approaching its return to live performance scheduled for Saturday at the Hoke Theatre in Elyria. "It's been a while," Civic Orchestra conductor Robert Beckstrom said. "While the musicians really missed playing, this concert is sort of a skeleton crew. It's a different kind of a performance playing lots of little pieces because in the practice room we're only allowed to have 10 people at a time. "Also, with the social distancing and all of the various rulings and so forth, it really sort of says we'd not do a standard orchestra concert because we need to be able to seat 30 or 40 people. That's obviously just not happening. So for this show we never have the full group on stage at any one time because of the social distancing requirements." Normally featuring roughly 40 musicians, this time around the Civic Orchestra will present numerous ensembles performing a varied program that includes pieces by Bach, Dvořák and Mozart, as well as Arcangelo Corelli's "Christmas Concerto." "The Christmas concerto is a nice piece, but it doesn't have any recognizable Christmas carols, so nobody is going to say, 'Why are they doing this?'" Beckstrom said. "If we didn't say its title, nobody would know. It's a really nice piece and the orchestra wanted to play it." Taking a glass-half-full approach to the program, Beckstrom said one benefit of a pared-down Civic Orchestra is he's able to tackle unique pieces normally eschewed for practical reasons. "What we're doing is nice little pieces that if we had everybody together I wouldn't dare do because I hate to have somebody stay at home and not play," said Beckstrom, who noted various pieces in the program are dedicated to musicians who passed away over the last year. "The other thing is, this features some of the musicianship of people in the orchestra. They're contributing some of the music that's going to be performed, which is also kind of nice." These musicians include William Rayer, Xenia Zhang and Dan Shell. The latter said he arranged a piece from Dvořák's "New World Symphony" for a quintet — flute, clarinet, violin, cello and bass. "This is one of my favorite pieces," Shell said. Tone-wise, Beckstrom said the program reflects not only springtime but also the general sense of hope that most folks crave these days. "It's going to be a nice intimate evening of comfortable, joyous pieces," Beckstrom said. "We're not going to be really high drama. We're doing really sweet music to celebrate spring and coming out of COVID. It'll be very pleasant." As for next year, Beckstrom is hopeful the Civic Orchestra will be at full strength the next time it graces the Hoke Theatre stage. "Everybody is crossing their fingers to get back to normal for the 2021-2022 season but we're just waiting for some of the final decisions by Stocker Center, the college and the state of Ohio," Beckstrom said. "However, our goal is to perform next season." WHO: Lorain County Community College's Civic Orchestra WHEN: 7:30 p.m. Saturday WHERE: Lorain County Community College's Hoke Theatre, 1005 Abbe Road N., Elyria TICKETS: $9 for adults ($8 for LCCC students, staff, children and seniors) INFO: (440) 366-4040 or stockerartscenter.com.