A holiday tradition continues this year with the Christmas Eve Carillon Concert on the Pew Grand Rapids Campus.
It's also a holiday custom that doesn't have to change for 2020 gathering standards -- it has always been a drive-up concert.
Retired GVSU carillonneur Julianne Vanden Wyngaard will climb the 112 steps of the Beckering Family Carillon Tower for a special performance. She said it was important to her to continue the tradition, which is celebrating a 20th anniversary.
She performs from the playing cabin, with the windows of the bell tower's belfry open on all sides, knowing an audience that she doesn't see has gathered in vehicles parked nearby. "Silent Night" always closes the concert.
"Then they just toot their horns and drift off into the darkness," Vanden Wyngaard said.
Vanden Wyngaard said the 9:30 p.m. concert is timed so that people with either evening or midnight services can still stop by to enjoy the music.
The concert is free and open to the public. Find more information here.
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