AGAPELLA Kicks Off the Christmas Season!

The Christmas lights are up on Orchard Road and at Vivocity-- and as was the case last year, AGAPELLA has already started our seasonal gigs! We did a weekend Christmas performance at Makarios cafe at the National Library two weeks back, and we're also performing tonight at an Alpha course celebration dinner at the Biopolis. We're pretty excited to be unveiling a couple of new songs this festive season: a spine-tinglingly tender and aching version of "O Holy Night" and a sassy, loud, clap-along-everybody rendition of "I Will Follow Him" from the soundtrack of the movie Sister Act. So don't miss it!

Oh by the way-- if you come to the Bukit Batok CC residents' Christmas Celebration on Saturday 15 Dec, you will hear a great rendition of "Mary Did You Know"-- a beautiful song by Mark Lowry that perfectly sums up the wonder of Christ's birth. Here's a story from the Christianity Today website about the song, which I know you will enjoy. Hope to see you at our upcoming gigs. Have a blessed Christmas!

--

Story Behind the Song
Mark Lowry's "Mary Did You Know?"

Mark Lowry is best known as a singer and comedian who spent more than a decade as a regular fixture of Bill Gaither's vocal band. But years from now, when all is said and done, Lowry's most enduring legacy will probably be the beautiful little song that he wrote 18 years ago as a meditation for a Christmas program at his church.

In 1984, the leaders at Lowry's Nashville congregation asked him if he'd be willing to write a musical for Advent. He gladly agreed. Inspiration came as Lowry focused his heart and mind on the wonder of Christmas.

"I tried to picture Mary holding the baby Jesus on the first Christmas morning and wondered what she was thinking about that child," he says. "She knew he was special—the Virgin Birth was her first clue—but could she ever imagine all the things that he would do while he was here?"

Soon, Lowry came up with a series of questions that he would like to ask Mary: "Did she know he would walk on water? Raise the dead? Give sight to the blind?"

Lowry decided to use the questions as a monologue to be recited between the scenes of his musical. But the profundity of those questions lingered in his mind long after the church musical was done.

Six years later, harmonica virtuoso Buddy Greene supplied just the right music and "Mary, Did You Know?" was complete.

Since then, Lowry and Greene's tune has become a modern classic. It has been recorded by more than 30 different artists (besides Lowry), including Kenny Rogers, Kathleen Battle, and Reba McEntire.

"I hear from a lot of people who have sung it in the church choir for Christmas and Easter programs," says Lowry. "When I wrote it, I felt there was something special there, but I never imagined how wide-reaching it would become."

by Mark Lowry and Buddy Greene © 1991 Word Music/Rufus Music/ascap. Used by permission.
Copyright © 2002 by the author or Christianity Today International/Today's Christian magazine (formerly Christian Reader). November/December 2002, Vol. 40, No. 6, Page 18

Song Lyrics

Mary did you know that your baby boy would some day walk on water?
Mary did you know that your baby boy would save our sons and daughters?
Did you know that your baby boy has come to make you new?
This child that you've delivered, will soon deliver you.

Mary did you know that your baby boy would give sight to a blind man?
Mary did you know that your baby boy would calm a storm with his hand?
Did you know that your baby boy has walked where angels trod?
And when your kiss your little baby, you have kissed the face of God.

Oh Mary did you know---

The blind will see, the deaf will hear, the dead will live again.
The lame will leap, the dumb will speak, the praises of the lamb.

Mary did you know that your baby boy is Lord of all creation?
Mary did you know that your baby boy would one day rule the nations?
Did you know that your baby boy is heaven's perfect Lamb?
This sleeping child you're holding is the great I-AM.