Noel Night ’08
So, today was Noel Night in Detroit. Now I have lived in Detroit for most of my life, and I had never heard of Noel Night, at least not that I can remember. However, this was the 36th annual Noel Night, so it has been around all of my life and then some.
Basically, what happens is the Cultural Center museums, including the DIA, the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, the Detroit Historical Museum, the Detroit Science Center, the Main Library, and others host a bunch of performances, activities, and celebrations related to the holiday season.
We got started a little late, so we spent the first half hour or so looking for parking. So, we did not really get going until after seven. Eventually, my father just let us off at the DIA to meet up with us after he parked, but we did not spend too too much time at the DIA at all. We saw a young orchestra playing in Prentis Court and passed by the kids decorating gingerbread men. We then continued out to the Main Library where we spent the rest of the evening.
There was a lot of good things at the Main Library that were a lot easier to find than they had been at the DIA. As soon as we came in, the Detroit Handbell Ensemble was playing Christmas songs. I do not know why, but I have always been intrigued by handbell ensembles, so we did stay and watch them for a bit. Here is a short clip.
We had come to the Main Library because there was supposed to be a puppet show. On the way to the puppet show, we had the pleasure of briefly hearing Detroit’s own Lisa Lauren Smith sing some Christmas songs from the floor above (Cass Mezzanine). She had a very nice voice, and I will be looking more into her music.
We also saw Lydia Cleaver playing the harp before the puppet show started. This was just beautiful to me, so I got a clip of that, too.
So, the puppet show was the Christmas Mouse Puppet show by Chris Clark, and it was terrible. When this guy was not repeatedly talking about having appeared on Rachel Ray and Letterman (he even worked this into the actual puppet show), he was just busy being corny. I said in a previous post that puppets can make anything funny, but not this guy. So, we did not stay at the puppet show for long.
In the same room, though, they had photos with Santa Claus, so I went ahead and took one. It took over an hour for it to print out, though. I guess it could have been worse. Those that did not print out that night would be available the following Tuesday.
After that, we went seeking out the free cider and donuts. There was also supposed to be dancing in the same room. I figured they might be playing Christmas songs, so we ventured to the third floor. There was big pretty Christmas tree, so we took advantage of the photo opportunity. The DJ, DJ Emmett, was the same DJ that opened for the Obama-office-sponsored Jay-Z concert that I attended earlier this year. Unfortunately, DJ Emmett was just playing regular music, so we left that room after a short time as well.
We also entertained ourselves by browsing the book sale, watching some period dancing, and otherwise taking in the sites. All in all, it was a good night. Here the pictures from the night:
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