‘Tis the season for tight skirts and tighter harmonies because your favorite all singing, all dancing girls, Gone Girls, are hauling out the holly for their Christmas spectacular December 9 at 7:30 p.m. at the Rio Grande Theatre. Featuring your favorite tunes in a vintage style such as “Jingle Bell Rock,” “White Christmas,” “The Christmas Song,” “Merry Christmas Darling,” “I'll Be Home for Christmas,” “Mele Kalikimaka” and more, their show entitled “Merry Christmas Darlings” is sure to get you in the Yuletide spirit.
The Gone Girls, classically trained singers who have been working together in various opera and musical theater endeavors since 2012, bring to life jazz standards and girl group music from the 1940s to the 1960s, like The Andrews Sisters, The Chordettes, and The Shirelles.
Group member and director, Christa Fredrickson, who is working on her Master’s Degree at New Mexico State University in choral conducting, explains how the group came together, “I went to undergrad with Valerie Mirelez, so we have been singing together for six or seven years. We always enjoyed singing classical and pop music together. Jamie Smith was in a community theater show I music directed and she is a strong musician. When I planned to do the first performance with them, it was going to be just a single show.”
But it didn’t turn out that way. In July of 2015, they debuted their first Gone Girls show at Boba Café and Cabaret, singing favorites from the past such as “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy,” “You’d be So Nice to Come Home To,” “Someone to Watch Over Me,” “Bei Mir Bist Du Shein,” and other Golden Age wartime songs in three-part harmony. Thanks to the positive response to that first performance, they have since done shows for Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Fourth of July, and performed for private events around the community.
Fredrickson says, “Valerie and I grew up loving the Andrews Sisters and Bing Crosby. It’s the type of music my grandmother raised me to love and appreciate. We wanted to bring to life these girls of the past, these girl groups that don’t exist anymore, so we did the first show in July meaning it to be a one-time-only show and it was really well received. There is a need in our community that hasn’t been met. People value and cherish this music that they grew up listening to and they want to be transported so they can enjoy it again. In our performances, we celebrate women and music and what they bring to the table that is so different and unique.”
She adds, “We all share the responsibility equally in three-part harmony. It’s not about soloing. It’s about singing tight harmonies together. And wearing cute dresses!”
For their Christmas show, they are accompanied by Seth Zamora, piano, Adriel Hernandez, bass guitar, and Isaac Rivera, drums.
Tickets are General Admission, open seating: $12 adults and $6 children 16 years and younger. The Rio Grande Theatre is located at 211 N. Main Street, Las Cruces, New Mexico, and is managed by the Doña Ana Arts Council. The theatre box office and Doña Ana Arts Council office is on the second floor of the theatre. Box office hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, and one hour prior to show time. For more information or to purchase tickets online, go to www.riograndetheatre.com or call (575) 523-6403.