It's not just on Christmas or during vacation periods; choir attendance has slackened over the past two years. I have responded by simplifying the music we sing and lowering my sights. Lots more unison chanting, which is actually fine with me, and heavy reliance on familiar traditional hymns and some familiar, carefully culled OCP songs. (St. Louis Jesuits have been retired.)

They are volunteer singers. They sing at their pleasure. Very few of them are church mice, most of them have busy lives, and their families are their top priority, not the parish choir.

I don't begrudge people who miss practice or a Sunday because they are busy with work or family obligations or who take vacations, even on holidays, and I tell them that whenever they say they will be missing a practice or some Sundays. I cheerfully tell them to enjoy their trips or their time with friends or family.

My parish choir is far from the most important thing in the world or even in my diocese, not even the most important thing in my choir members' lives.

I have a roster of 38 choir members, and my two best-attended Masses have sixteen and eight people in the choirs at those Mass times. That should be enough to sing some very good and nice music, but the unreliable and unpredictable attendance at rehearsals makes it impossible to learn and practice complicated pieces together.

I've accepted that the choir will be this way. Considering the struggles my neighboring parish music directors are having just getting people to join choir, I'm sort of sitting pretty.

My attendance policy is casual. I have decided that's the best way to handle the volunteers I have. That's the way it is. No use fretting about it.

Corpus Christi typically falls around the beginning of vacation season after the end of the school year, so I am not surprised if it attendance lags, especially if CC falls in the second half of June. The more your choir is comprised of members with children, the more likely that may be.

Unless your choir is blessed to be full of members who are hosts of principal Christmas gatherings, you're generally out of luck these days in any urban or suburban area where many folks live more than an hour or two away from their families who are hosting principal Christmas gathering. "I won't be seeing you, Mom and Dad, et cet., on Christmas Eve/Day, because I will be singing the Masses" is not something many volunteer choristers will persevere in. (I was one who did back in the day, but I know I was unusual in that regard, and my parents happened not to mind, but I changed my practice as they got became elderly and frailer.)

The most you can do is (1) ask for commitments in advance, and (2) adjust programming to reflect reduced forces.

Fortunately, I was never in a parish where I needed to sing Midnight Mass (I have never been to one, have no desire to attend one - I've always cherished Mass on Christmas morning), because I would never have sung at that Mass. (My body is used to sleeping from 8PM to 4AM for decades, so even if awake my voice is worthless because it's in the middle of its upper respiratory congestion cycle in the middle of that period. No one would want me to sing at that hour. I am also asleep when the New Year is rung in by others. My voice would likewise degrade over the course of Easter Vigils the later they ran.)

For choirs that are significantly reduced in numbers at Christmas, I would suggest making Epiphany more the focus of amplified choral splendors. Instead of Christmas starting off with a bang followed by a fade, the liturgical music energy builds up while the secular world has moved on from Christmas; there's some good witness in that.

I leave it entirely up to the choir members to choose which Masses to sing at on regular Sundays and on holy days of obligation. If they want to sing at the Vigil and not on Easter Sunday, fine. Vice-versa? Fine. If they want to sing at both, great. I don't pressure anyone about attending or singing at anything. I provide the schedule, I provide a list of the music, I hold rehearsals, and I ask people to RSVP for the special Masses so I have an idea who is going to be there. But I leave it to the choir members to decide when they will sing. No pressure, no cajoling, no begging. They are volunteers and they are adults (well, except a few high schoolers), and I respect their time and their freedom.

My pastor doesn't pressure me nor the choir members in any way about attendance at anything.

I'm also of the opinion that it's a waste of time and effort to "go big" for Christmas and Easter, preparing months in advance. I keep it quite simple and easily manageable, and most of the music I program is singable by the assembly and familiar.

I’m starting a new job in a few weeks. I’m told attendance at the parish in general on Christmas is significantly reduced from a normal weekend, due to people traveling “home” to be with family. So I’m just planning on traditional carols, chant, French organ repertoire, and (if I have enough choir members) some simple choral music.

You figure out the cards you’ve been dealt and then make the best poker hand you can with it. Would I love to do the Charpentier Mass again? Sure. But I’m not going to try to force it where it shouldn’t organically happen.

…I’m not going to try to force it where it shouldn’t organically happen.

This should be framed on the walls of our offices…

I've always told the choir that they are expected at the Christmas night Mass and I'd be grateful if they'd show up for the day one, but I'm not asking them to. We usually get a few to show on Christmas day, enough to allow some harmony parts.

We do the Easter vigil, and an authentic midnight mass.

The choir will sing Easter morning, since, although the vigil is long, it is over at a reasonable hour, whereas we just have other special music Christmas morning since it’s a bit much to ask them to come back after only heading home at 1:20am. (And this year will be a doozy since Advent IV and Christmas Eve are the same day… yikes.)

In my previous post at a suburban Catholic mega-parish, the Festival Choir sang for Easter Vigil and the "faithful remnant" (this is what the pastor called them) returned for one of the Easter morning Masses. Same thing for Midnight Mass/Christmas Day. We did the big choral pieces at the Vigil/Midnight Mass and repeated one of the easier choral pieces for the Mass of the Day.

A strategy that I found very helpful at the large parish (and introduced at my new parish in a small town, where I have been for a year) is to gather up all the cantors and schedule them in pairs or even quartets for the non-choir feast days Masses. At the mega-parish, I had about 25 cantors (5 weekend Masses). Many of the best cantors did not sing in the parish choir because of family responsibilities, Mass time preference, etc... but had stronger vocal skills than the average volunteer choir member, so we could sing 2-3 part choral music with one person on a part (I also sing, which increased the options for what we could do). This was a very effective way to add to the solemnity of the non-choir Masses on feast days, and the cantors really enjoy it because they often sing alone. I required one rehearsal in advance for feast day Masses.

I tried this model at my new small-town parish, and again, the cantors really enjoyed it. There are about 6 cantors here, so with me singing/playing organ and 2 cantors at a Mass, we could sing three-part harmony.

We used to sing both Midnight Mass and Christmas Day, as well as a big 8-anthem Easter Vigil. Only this last year did the choir ask for time off, and I had a quartet take the nighttime services. With strong readers we were able to be more adventurous than usual in repertoire with a one hour rehearsal:

11:30 prelude to Midnight Mass:
Dmitri Bortnianski: Cherubic Hymn No. 7
hymn 195 Creator of the stars of night
Roland de Lassus: Consolamini popule meus
hymn 196 O come divine Messiah
Igor Stravinsky: Ave Maria
hymn 214 Lo how a rose
anon. 6th c. Puer natus est
anon. c. 1555 Un niño nos es naçido
hymn 211 Of the Father’s love begotten
Jean Mouton: Quaeremus cum pastoribus

(hymns 14’ anthems ~14’)

At Midnight Mass:
O come all you faithful
     Proclamation sung during candle lighting
Mouton: Noe, noe psallite
Comm. In splendoribus
Silent Night
Hark the herald angels sing

I pinch pennies all year to have strings and brass at Midnight Mass. They accompany hymns, Gloria, Sanctus, and Agnus Dei as well as one or two simple motels with choir. It makes life, family, and choir easier for all involved.

In response to Don9of11, our choir is actually predominantly people in their 20s and 30s. We do have a number of retired and semi-retired members too. Most of the choir members arent married or are married but don't have (young) children. The younger ones seem to have the best attendance. (As an FYI, I'm in the middle -- neither young nor retired.)

So all is not lost!

This year the calendar has given us an interesting Christmas... My volunteers will be singing 11am Christmas eve, Anticipated Midnight Mass and 11am Christmas day.

Although we usually sing most days between Christmas and Epiphany so it is not too different to most years.

I think of harp (with flute, perhaps) - rather than organ or brass - for this carol, for example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IOTyW287v4

All this night shrill chanticleer,
Day's proclaiming trumpeter,
Claps his wings and loudly cries,
Mortals, mortals, wake and rise!
See a wonder Heaven is under;
From the earth is risen a Sun,
Shines all night, though day be done.

Wake, O earth, wake everything!
Wake and hear the joy I bring;
Wake and joy; for all this night
Heaven and every twinkling light
All amazing, still stand gazing.
Angels, powers, and all that be,
Wake, and joy this Sun to see.

Hail, O sun, O blessed Light,
Sent into the world by night!
Let Thy rays and heavenly powers
Shine in these dark souls of ours;
For most duly thou art truly
God and man, we do confess:
Hail, O Sun of Righteousness!

Most parishes don’t put their money on sacred music anymore. They’re fine about paying the repair man they’re fine about paying the plumber they’re fine about paying the accountant etc. etc. you get what you pay for. And Sacred Music should be at the top of the list and it’s at the bottom.