Everyone knows about our school’s holiday traditions, like Sub for Santa, the Ugly Sweater Stag and caroling, but many groups, like the choir, have their own traditions. Choir students enjoy many traditions during the holiday season, whether it’s extra events or songs they sing. Some of these traditions have existed for years now, but most people just don’t know about them.

One of the oldest traditions is the trip to Temple Square in Salt Lake. Mr. Russell Oliphant, the Timpview choir director, has continued it for years, inheriting it from the previous choir director. “[The choirs have been going to Temple Square] as long as I can remember… We’ve been there at least for the last six years.” He loves bringing the choirs to Salt Lake every year. “They get to sing at some really cool places, some beautiful places, and some great acoustic spaces. We get to practice our Christmas music, and we get to bring Christmas cheer to people.”

The most recently instituted tradition is the hot chocolate social. After the Christmas concert the students help make hot chocolate in the commons while others perform solo or group Christmas songs. Because the hot chocolate social is put on by students, Oliphant can’t always come because of his other post-concert duties. “This is the first year I actually got to go out to the hot chocolate social, and it looked pretty fun!” he said. “[The hot chocolate social is a tradition] that we’ve started since I’ve been here. A lot of [the traditions] started before I got here and I just kind of carried them over.”

Choir isn’t the only group with their own traditions. Timpview has dozens of groups with many traditions, so people don’t know about every groups’ traditions. There are lots of things to get involved in this holiday season. Hopefully this makes you curious to see what other things people do this time of year to spread the holiday spirit.