Minor masterpieces for Christmas

By WILLIAM DART

It's not every CD that makes your mouth water. The NZSO's Christmas Baroque might do just that, thanks to a gorgeous image of Dick Frizzell's fruit-stuffed, sauce-sodden Christmas pudding on its cover.

The music is less calorific - 65 minutes of seasonal offerings, mostly on the pastoral side, and taken from minor 18th-century masters. A minute or so of a Bach Sinfonia and the Pastoral Symphony from Handel's Messiah are the only concessions to standard repertoire.

Performances are amiable and conductor Marc Taddei keeps it all crisp and crackling in the tempo department although, for me, there's a little too much blandness.

Christmas Baroque is at its best when the energy levels go into red, when we can revel in the Mannheim hustle of a Stamitz Presto or the elemental brass writing in a Pastorale by Joseph Haydn's younger brother, Michael.

Trust Records have outdone themselves in the art department with the booklet for Diedre Irons' recital; there is not one but four artworks, including a Sam Mahon portrait of the pianist, a nice touch.

The album is an overdue portrait in sound of one of the country's more charismatic musicians, in a programme ranging from Mozart to Gershwin.

Among moments to be treasured is a performance of Schumann's Papillons which catches this mercurial score in its fluttering and occasionally nervy changes of mood.

Ravel's Sonatine bewitches, thanks to the clarity of Irons' playing and the recording, which makes the most of the instrument's lingering sonorities.

Unfortunately, there are missed opportunities. Irons has New Zealand music in her piano stool - in 1999 she played a selection of Jenny McLeod's Tone Clock Pieces at the Composing Women's Festival - and they would have been a considerable asset to this programme.

You couldn't find anything more staunchly Kiwi than Atoll's reissue of recordings by the 1953 National Band of New Zealand, the legendary band that won the 101st British Open Brass Band Championships.

Rousing marches like William Rimmer's Harlequin sit alongside an ambitious Epic Symphony by Percy Fletcher. Dave Christensen gives Rossini's Una voce poco fa a rattling good workout on cornet and, at one point, during the hymn-tune Abide with Me, the bandsmen put down their instruments and sing. It's a spine-tingler.

This is our history. The concert was recorded in the Wellington Town Hall in 1953 and John Harrison's booklet essay is a fascinating yarn, including one great image of the men checking a new score in the bar, beers in hand and, in one case, cigarette in mouth.

Jointly released with the National Library of New Zealand's Treasures in Sound He Puiaki Puoru, The 1953 National Band of New Zealand is just that.

* New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, Christmas Baroque (Trust MMT 2043); Diedre Irons, Piano Recital (Trust MMT 2041); The 1953 National Band of New Zealand (Atoll ACD 502).