CLASSICAL | Concentus Women's Chorus 

If you can't beat the winter cold, sing about it. That is the reasoning behind one of the first choral concerts of the new year, presented this weekend by Concentus Women's Chorus. The program features what director Gwen Gassler describes as "seasonal choral music in a very broad sense." It begins with the ancient chant "Hodie Christus natus est," and includes carols by Peter Warlock (originally with orchestral accompaniment, which will show off Concentus's pianist Linda Boianova) and a setting of Yeats's "When You Are Old." The temperature will drop considerably for "Ice," by the appropriately named Canadian composer Bruce Sled. This imaginative, wordless piece for a cappella women's choir combines shivery, dissonant harmonies with chilly vocal effects that evoke whistling wind, cracking ice, and other familiar January sounds.

Concentus presents "Snow Carols" on Friday, January 9, 7:30 p.m., at Asbury First United Methodist Church, 1050 East Avenue; and Sunday, January 11, 2 p.m., at Third Presbyterian Church, 4 Meigs Street. concentus.org.