Mannheim holiday show delights

MANNHEIM STEAMROLLER, Friday and Saturday, E Center.

The holiday season officially started this past weekend.

Mannheim Steamroller celebrated 20 years of Christmas music when it steamrolled a couple of audiences in the E Center over the weekend.

Founder/drummer Chip Davis, violinist/concertmaster Arnie Roth, recordist Roxanne Layton, guitarist Ron Cooley and keyboardists Jackson Berkey and his wife, Almeda Berkey, started things out with a new piece called "Celebration," taken from the new "greatest hits" album "Christmas Celebration."

The band was backed by the Mannheim Steamroller Orchestra, conducted by Chuck Penington.

The signature rocker "Deck the Halls" and the more intimate "We Three Kings" hushed the audience as visuals of ancient desert royalty sitting around a campfire were projected on the five screens suspended above the stage.

Jazzy arrangements of "Good King Wenceslas," "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" and "Hark! the Herald Angels Sing" counteracted the soothing, more sentimental and somewhat nostalgic "Christmas Lullaby," "Traditions of Christmas" and "White Christmas."

A syncopated, almost cha-cha version of Tchaikovsky's "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy," re-christened "Faeries," charmed the audience as did the lovely "Cantique de Noel" ("O Holy Night").

After intermission, Davis and the band took the audience back to the times of kings, queens, lords and ladies. The band became a traveling minstrel act as it performed medieval arrangements of "Gagliarda," "In Dulci Jubilo," "Wassail, Wassail" and "I Saw Three Ships."

During these works, the video screens depicted great castle dining halls and busy kitchens.

"God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" and the funky "Little Drummer Boy," which the band played in perfect sync to the video production, brought the house down.

"Winter Wonderland" and the surreal "Carol of the Bells" showed off the playful musicality of both the band and the orchestra.

The encore consisted of the recorder-laden Spanish carol "Fum Fum Fum" and the reverent "Stille Nacht" ("Silent Night").

The delightful performance was highlighted by a Christmas village and live "toy" soldiers that were on display before the show and during intermission.

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E-mail: scott@desnews.com