HAZEN - The notes weave, how they weave. A winding ribbon of half- and quarter-notes, they weave Christmases past, present and future.

The notes weave a gift of music sung a long time by those who love to sing for those who love to listen.

The weaving ribbon stretches back 50 years in time, when the Knife River Chorale assembled for the first time in the old Hazen school gym.

The town and many of the singers were much younger then. Still the town comes, and still the singers sing.

The man who directed the chorale that first year, Dave Schoenrock, still does.

This year, when the chorale sings for Christmas at 7 p.m. Dec. 16 and 17, Schoenrock will be at the director's podium, wearing his trademark tuxedo tails, lending his own black and white note of elegance to the affair.

Anyone who ever sang is invited back to sing again. Rehearsals begin at 3 p.m. Oct. 29 in the Hazen High School band room.

Elda Drath Baisch, of Hazen, will anchor the altos as she has every year, except that one 40 years ago when she was pregnant and seeing her father through health problems.

Alto notes blend the bass to the soprano.

They hold a chorus together, and Baisch has done that through her faithfulness in keeping the chorale's history notes and records.

She remembers, back in the day, when a chorale intermission was punctuated by spiked nog to lubricate the singers' pipes.

Those were the days when the second half of the concert was perhaps a bit livelier than the first, surely a bit more red of cheek.

The nog was a victim of political correctness - as many things have and not always for the better - and the chorale sang on.

Baisch gets tears in her eyes and a lump in her throat trying to explain what all the years of singing have meant to her.

The notes unending, the feeling of musical communion with so many other singers over the years, the holiday friendships and the memories - all of those, she says.

Singers have come from all over Coal Country and beyond, some for a year or two, some for decades.

The Christmas music is always beautiful, ranging from deeply religious, to classical, to contemporary.

As Schoenrock says, "This is not a 'Deck the Halls' type of situation."

The notes from all the singers are a gift each year to the hundreds who have sat in the darkened gymnasium, smelled the fresh pine branches and experienced the magic.

Schoenrock has had some health problems in the past year, but there's "no doubt about it," he'll be front and center for this 50th anniversary performance.

He is the son of a church builder and a church builder himself, landing in Hazen in 1955 because his father was here, building St. Matthew Lutheran Church.

He married a German woman, and their six children experienced the chorale as part of Christmas. They all still travel home for the notes that have woven through all of their lives.

Schoenrock has been the anchor and the driving force, a serious musician, as is his wife, Gisela. The two have chosen the music, always searching for pieces with depth and challenge.

Over these 50 years, there have been more than 500 voices in the chorale, 84 instrumentalists, six narrators and more than 300 musical selections.

Some of those voices are now deceased, their notes faded forever, after blending with the chorale for most of its history.

They were always there in white robe and red stole and then one Christmas, they were not.

Schoenrock said he wants some of the senior chorale members to choose their favorite pieces from past years, and he will do the same for this anniversary performance.

Ideally, he would like to direct at least 50 voices, the optimal number and especially fitting for the anniversary, he thinks.

He is 78 now, and there will come one future Christmas when the task of directing the chorale will perforce move on to someone else.

He said he believes the tradition is strong enough that it will continue. The chorale will sing on and the notes of Christmases to come will weave into the past.

(Reach reporter Lauren Donovan at 888-303-5511 or lauren@;westriv.com.)