THE Launceston Choral Society raised over £1,600 this year for the Salvation Army’s Christmas work in the community.

At the Choral Society’s recent annual Christmas concert, ‘Christmas in Words and Music’, held in the Central Methodist Church on December 10, the retiring collection raised over £450 for Launceston Salvation Army, bringing the sum raised by the society for local and national charities in 2016 to £1,677.64.

The society has a very loyal audience who are always very generous at the end of its concert. At the concert this time, there were carols old and new, some performed by the choir and some for community singing as well as a mixed bag of seasonal readings, which this year included writers from Dickens to Tennyson, Charles Causley to Simon Parker, as well as an up to the minute ‘politically correct Christmas’ by anon.

After the concert the choir and audience enjoyed hot drinks and mince pies as a cheerful starter to Christmas time.

The society now has a website so people can keep up to date with its activities online at www.launcestonchoralsociety.btck.co.uk

The next concert is on Saturday, April 8, 2017, when it will be performing Josef Haydn’s ‘Seasons’.