Keith Getty wants to put you in the mood for a Green Christmas.
He appears Thursday night at the Santander Performing Arts Center with his wife Kristyn for “Sing! An Irish Christmas” in a show that mixes carol singing and storytelling – all with a brogue.
Getty said the show is a mix of traditional Christmas carols, as well as carols he’s written.
“I write a new carol every year,” said the award-winning hymnist. “They are smattered throughout the show.”
When you go, he said, be prepared to participate.
“I have the whole congregation singing ‘Silent Night’ in four-part harmony,” he said. “Children, too.”
Getty said his wife Kristyn is the lead singer “and the pretty one,” and that the music is interspersed with stories and traditional dance.
“We want to get families singing again,” he said of his ultimate goal.
And part of that is writing songs that families will sing for generations to come.
As a modern hymn writer, Getty said he’s always been interested in church music in a deeper way than typical Christian songwriters, who work more in the moment.
“Hymns are about teaching,” he said. “They are doctrinally rich. But you are also writing a song that is speaking to generations. People need to be able to sing it for the duration of the publication (of the hymnal), and that can be 30 years or more.”
Because of the unique parameters of hymn writing, Getty said that even songs that come easily can take months to perfect.
“A hymn lyric cannot be written in 10 minutes,” he said. “It needs to be theologically developed.”
Still, there is nothing he and Kristyn would rather be doing.
The couple has been married just shy of 14 years and have never spent a night apart, Getty said. They have three daughters, with a fourth daughter due at the end of March.
“I like to joke that I write hymns but make hers,” he said, laughing.
The family divides its time between Nashville, Tennessee and Northern Ireland, where Getty was raised in the Presbyterian church. He now belongs to a non-denominational Christian congregation.
He was recently bestowed the Order of the British Empire (OBE) by Queen Elizabeth II for his work in music and hymnwriting, including “In Christ Alone,” and “See What a Morning.”
“That really opened up a lot of doors,” he said, adding he was honored by the British Parliament, and a few weeks ago was invited to perform at a party hosted by Vice President Michael R. Pence.
The day before the Reading performance, he’ll log his fourth performance at New York’s Carnegie Hall.
His PBS special has aired to more than 45 million people, he said.
That warms his heart because he sees his mission as getting more families to sing together.
“Imagine a generation of families of singers,” he said. “Imagine the different posture that would have with the church if you went in and people were joyfully and with thanksgiving, singing. It would only be positive.”
He said that’s why he believes he’s doing what he’s meant to do, and his dream is to simply continue to do more of it.
“I don’t look at writing hymns as the gateway to anything,” he said. “It’s the thing that drives me. Helping Christians around the world changes every part of your life and every part of your family’s life. If you look through history you learn so much of people by what they sang. We want homes to be filled with songs of the Lord.”
While that is a very serious pursuit, Getty does not take himself too seriously.
“It’s a wonderful evening,” he said. “And after (the musicians) go into the lobby and do an Irish Christmas Jam. It’s a total laugh.”
Contact Tracy Rasmussen: weekend@readingeagle.com.
