FOR the second year running, York Musical Society will donate the profits from December 8's Christmas performance to Changing Lives, a charity that serves homeless people in the city.

From last year's concert, YMS raised more than £1,000 for the charity when it was known as York ArcLight.

York Brass Quintet will add to the festivities once more at next Saturday's 4pm performance at St Lawrence's Church, Lawrence Street, York, where seasonal favourites Frosty The Snowman and In The Bleak Midwinter will be played by the York ensemble of two trumpets, horn, trombone and tuba.

The YMS chorus of 100-plus singers will perform well-known choruses from Handel’s Messiah, as well as Vaughan Williams’ Fantasia on Christmas Carols, for which the tenor soloist will be Dominic Rose.

Christmas carols old and new will feature too, such as Silent Night, in its 200th anniversary year since it was first sung in Austria. The audience will be invited to join in with the choir and brass quintet for Hark The Herald Angels Sing.

YMS will be conducted by Richard Shephard,while David Pipe will accompany the choir on the organ, as well as playing Shephard's Prelude and Fugue on Tempus Adest Floridum. And yes, Pipe promises to give his now-famed rendition of Sleigh Ride too.

Conductor and composer Shephard is closely associated with York Minster, as well as being YMS’s associate conductor and accompanist and a former headmaster of the Minster School for 19 years. Organist Pipe, YMS's principal conductor since April 2012, is director of the organists’ training programme and cathedral organist in the Diocese of Leeds and was formerly assistant director of music at York Minster.

York Brass Quintet comprises Connor McLean and Sam Rees, trumpets, Peter Baumann, horn, Idris al-Ghabra, trombone, and Brandon Cox, tuba. The quintet was formed at the University of York and members play in a range of other ensembles.

Tickets cost £10, £5 for students and children over 12 years old, free for children under 12 when accompanied by a paying adult, and are available from the York Theatre Royal box office in person, on 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk or on the door. All seats are unreserved.

Any profits from the concert, plus a retiring collection, will be donated to Changing Lives. Tea and cake will be available in the parish room afterwards, in aid of church funds.

The fully heated St Lawrence's Church is York’s largest parish church, a Victorian building whose spire can be seen for miles around.

Charles Hutchinson