Lenox — If you thought Jupiter was the greatest purveyor of jollity, just because Gustav Holst told you so, it might interest you to know that one of the most reliable sources of winter jollity in New England happens to be a group of brass players from the Boston Symphony Orchestra. These are the guys who make the Boston Pops really pop in their winter holiday concerts, and a series of small miracles is bringing their holiday mojo to Tanglewood’s Linde Center for Music and Learning on December 14 and 15.
The program for both performances consists of popular tunes for every age, delivered with all the verve and precision you get in one of the BSO’s GRAMMY-winning Shostakovich performances.
One of the surest harbingers of musical pleasure at Tanglewood is seeing Mike Roylance’s tuba swing up onto his lap in the BSO brass section before rumbling to life at the bottom of some massively glorious chord that shakes the whole Koussevitzky Music Shed. If you are located near the edge of Section Two when this occurs, you can almost feel the sound wave coming from Mike’s instrument.
Imagine what that instrument will sound like in Studio E of Tanglewood’s Linde Center for Music and Learning when Mike joins BSO principal trumpet Thomas Rolfs, principal trombone Toby Oft, fourth/utility trumpet Michael Martin, and third horn Michael Winter in a 90-minute program of winter holiday classics. The acoustics in Studio E are so fine I would be happy to hear these guys play scales in that room.
In case you hadn’t noticed, the most successful planner of large-scale winter holiday parties this side of the Atlantic is the Boston Symphony Orchestra. The Boston Pops Orchestra has been giving special concerts every holiday season for over half a century, and they have gotten really good at it.
For one thing, they understand the importance of food at winter holiday events designed for children, and they apply their knowledge thoughtfully. The following is only a sample of the elf-approved spread of complimentary comestibles you can expect to find at the Linde Center on the 14th and 15th: decorated cookies, snowman cake pops, gingerbread roulades, peppermint bark whoopie pies, and not a morsel of stinky cheese. This is for kids. All these modern-day sugar plums are possible options, not a menu.
The BSO has reckoned that holiday brass shows at the Linde Center on two consecutive days will be enough to satisfy demand. Smart concert-goers aren’t so sure about that and will be purchasing their tickets early, which they can do here.
Enjoy the bracing tones of five world-class brass players from the Boston Symphony Orchestra performing a program of winter holiday classics on December 14, at 7 p.m., or on December 15, at 3 p.m., at Tanglewood’s Linde Center for Music and Learning, Lenox/Stockbridge. If there really is a Santa, then it is highly likely he will make an appearance at the Linde Center on both days.
