THE festive spirit was shared in Kerang on Saturday at the combined church annual Carols by Candlelight.
A crowd of about 400 people enjoyed picnics and sung from the same songbook as a light breeze made the warm evening bearable at Atkinson Park.
Local schools had children performing carols on stage, as well as church choirs and special duets.
Organiser Tim Nitschke said the event was another success.
“Someone asked me if the crowd was getting bigger each year,” he said.
“I think each year that we’re having it, it seems as though there’s more and more attending.
“I think having it on a Saturday as opposed to a Sunday was beneficial because what I noticed was families and children all hung around until the end.
“We didn’t see too many people leave before the end of the evening, because we finished at 9pm and not 10pm like previous years.
“I think that was more family-friendly and more community-orientated as well.
“It’s always a challenge to get the right balance, because you get the oldies in the community that want to sing the carols and you get the younger ones in the community that just want to be entertained.”
The food and drink vendors were kept busy, with queues in front of food vans throughout the evening.
Mr Nitschke said the children loved performing in front of family, friends and their teachers.
“One of the things that we have done is we’ve done backing tracks now for them, because one of the bits of feedback we got from the community is it’s hard to mic the kids up and to be able to hear them.
“We’ve sort of tried to encourage the crowd to move forward as much as you can … by having the backing tracks, that also helps considerably, because everyone can see the kids, so they can really hear them, even from a distance.
“You see all the parents come up and do all the photos and all that stuff, which is great.”
Mr Nitschke said the Christmas message this year was the three wise camels.
“We have the three wise men, well, we put a little spin on it and in line with equity for the animals, and spoke about the three wise camels and how they headed across to see the birth of Jesus,” he said.
“And just reminding everyone about the true meaning of Christmas and celebrating the birth of Jesus.
“We did speak about the fact Christmas is very much about family and very much about giving.
“We didn’t want to water down the fact that the greatest gift we have is the gift of Jesus.”
