The Crossing @ Christmas

PROGRAM

The Crossing @ Christmas
The Jeffrey Dinsmore Memorial Concerts

The world premieres of Sarah Rimkus’ Nativity 
and Ukrainian composer Natalia Tsupryk’s Kyiv (choral version)

with Thomas Mesa, cello

Donald Nally, artistic director

DATE & TIME

December 20, 2025

5:00 p.m.

LOCATION

Saint Peter's Church

619 Lexington Avenue

New York, NY 10022

(212) 935-2200

https://www.saintpeters.org/visitchurch

TICKETING

Tickets are $40 for general admission, with a pay-as-you-can option.

How does a Christmas song express our numerousness? 

A mother’s contemplations on her child’s destiny contrast with our desire for peace and our seeming inability to achieve it. Mary intuits her son’s journey: birth, life, and sacrifice—like us, holding hope of a common fate of freedom. We introduce works of Ukrainian composer Natalia Tsupryk, including a world premiere of a choral transcription of her Kyiv. At the center of C@C 2025 is the culminating work of 2024– 2025 Resident Composer Sarah Rimkus’ Nativity, featuring our long-time collaborative cellist Thomas Mesa. 

Joyful motets and sorrowful laments, asking the question, “What is nativity?” 

Mother. Birth. Gloria. Snow. Air Raid. 

Sarah Rimkus’ residency and world premiere are supported by generous gifts from Peter and Judy Leone. 

This performance anticipates our next New York City concert at Zankel Hall, Carnegie Hall, on March 24, 2026.

THE CHOIR

Musical America’s 2024 Ensemble of the Year, The Crossing is a four-time Grammy winning chamber choir conducted by Donald Nally and dedicated to creating and recording new music that expand ways of writing, singing, and listening to choral music. The ensemble was the American Composers Forums’ 2017 Champion of New Music, and their commission Sound from The Bench by Ted Hearne was named a 2018 Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Music. They were the recipient of the 2015 Margaret Hillis Award for Choral Excellence and have received three ASCAP Awards for Adventurous Programming, as well as the Dale Warland Singers Commission Award with composer Joel Puckett from Chorus America. Having presented nearly 180 commissioned world premieres, the choir's recent projects include Julia Wolfe’s historical oratorio Fire in My Mouth with the New York Philharmonic, Tyondai Braxton’s manga-based choral symphony Telekinesis, and Robert Maggio’s theatrical work Aniara with The Netherlands’ Klockriketeatern.