Family Christmas Concert by the Jena Philharmonic

The grumpy businessman Ebenezer Scrooge hates Christmas: after all, he has to give this day off to his employee Bob Cratchit, whom he mercilessly exploits all year long. He is not exactly compassionate otherwise: he brusquely dismisses two gentlemen asking for donations for the poor, as well as his nephew Fred, who invites him to Christmas dinner. Only the sudden appearance of his long-deceased business partner Jacob Marley, who wanders among humans as a ghost punished for his greed, sparks a change of heart in Scrooge. When three more spirits confront him with scenes from his past and future, he realizes he must change fundamentally…

Composer Henrik Albrecht has turned Charles Dickens’s world-famous mid-19th-century Christmas classic into an exciting orchestral radio play for today’s ears. Narrator Patrick Rohbeck and the Jena Philharmonic under the direction of Friederike Kienle serve up his musical Christmas punch, blended from Hollywood movie sounds, a touch of reconciliatory strings, solemn brass chorales, and well-known Christmas carols in ever-new arrangements on the 1st and 2nd days of Christmas. /JN

Program

Henrik Albrecht:

“A Christmas Carol,” an orchestral radio play after the story by Charles Dickens

Performers

Patrick Rohbeck, narrator

Jena Philharmonic

Friederike Kienle, conductor

Notes

Recommended for families with children 6 years and older

Additional performance

Sat, December 26, 2026, 11:00 AM