For many years, I have had a recurring sugarplum-infested holiday dream that I’ve held very close to my enlarged heart: to hear Mannheim Steamroller’s yuletide declaration of holiday thunder “Deck the Halls” performed absolutely live.
And, like an angel descending from the heavens to grant me my winter solstice want, that Christmas chimera finally came true when I saw Mannheim Steamroller live at the Civic Center Music Hall last week to perform that tune and many others on-stage to a maybe sold-out audience of retirees, boomers and Gen Xers on the cusp of irrelevancy, much like me.
Standing in the frigid air before the show, waiting in line as the Civic Center implemented their newish security measures, while it loudly upset people who have never had to deal with pat-downs and general frisks in their daily life, for me it brought back memories of growing up in an Oklahoma City public school, the rough-hewn hands of a science teacher gently squeezing me.
Once past this security point, however, the holiday spirit was alive and well in the Civic Center lobby, with a mostly gratuitous tree welcoming fans of the quasi-prog rock outfit orchestrated by Chip Davis in 1974. Originally known for their soothing proto-New Age Fresh Aire albums, the Steamroller didn’t start flattening the Christmas music market until the release of Christmas in 1984—exactly 35 years ago and 41 million albums later.