The Night Before Christmas... Again!

 

Naxos must have had a hit on their hands with the earlier Night Before Christmas, for this sequel appeared some five years later with yet another celebrity narrator.

I had mentioned in that earlier review (BLOG), how I appreciated the program focusing on light, Classical Music rather than the now popular assembly line of tuneful Christmas carols arrangements and seasonal medleys.

Aside from some very short nods to Tchaikovsky and Liszt, this program makes an abrupt turn to churn out just what the other one avoided.

Philip Lane provides most of the orchestrations and arrangements, as it was in the earlier entry. Simon Callow is on call to narrate Another Night Before Christmas, as well as Scrooge this time, replacing the earlier Stephen Fry, but keeping the British dialect. So too, conductor Barry Wordsworth and the BBC Concert Orchestra are out, and in comes light-music aficionado Gavin Sutherland leading both the RTÉ Concert Orchestra and the Royal Ballet Sinfonia.

I am not overjoyed with this later entry, but I think it will be enjoyable for most.



A review from 2023

A sequel to The Night Before Christmas released by Naxos, Another Night Before Christmas is full of spirit-lifting seasonal tidings. Most of the music is purely orchestral music; medleys of familiar carols, a few classical pieces with yuletide connections, and a couple of short, original, fanciful compositions.

The headliners here are the narrated orchestral works. Scrooge is a 20-minute radio play type affair, traversing the familiar tale with musical portraits reacting to the story. My only problem with this adaptation is the glossing over of the Christmas ghosts (except Marley), instead spending the last half at Fezziwig’s dance party. The spirits of Past, Present, and Future seem ripe for musical interpolations, but alas, that is not the case here.

The other is Another Night Before Christmas, a 6-minute updated version of the famed poem. Simon Callow narrates both this and Scrooge, and does an admirable job. Music for both are pleasant, witty, and slightly cinematic, which also is true for the Christmas suites from John Fox and Philip Lane. It is nice to have familiar seasonal tunes included, and these are arranged well as holiday pops orchestra fare.

The short works from Curtis, Saunders, Morley, and Hewitt Jones are colorful, vivacious confections. I am not as wild about the ‘historical’ classical works included; the Liszt was never memorable or particularly entertaining to my mind, and the Rebikov Waltz and Tchaikovsky Troika seem throwaways.

The Naxos sonics are also cinematic, with a strong, deep bass, and vivid orchestral colours. Most of the music is played by the Royal Ballet Sinfonia, and played well too. The few contributions from the RTÉ Concert Orchestra are more strident sounding, with studio reverb gone too far. Gavin Sutherland is a light-music connoisseur who is most welcome leading this type of music; never underplayed, and energetic joy at the fore.

I preferred the first volume of The Night Before Christmas, plus another holiday-tune orchestral collection on Naxos. This sequel is OK, yet will appease most for holiday spirit.

Works

Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Troika (3.07)

Franz Liszt
Christmas Tree Suite (103.37)

Vladimir Rebikov
Christmas Tree Suite: Waltz (2.25)

Philip Lane
Old Christmas Music (12.11)
Another Night Before Christmas (6.00)

Brian Kelly
Scrooge (19.47)

John Fox
Carol Fantasia (6.18)

Otto Nicolai
Christmas Overture (11.26)

Matthew Curtis
Christmas Rush (4.23)

Adam Saunders
Fairytale Sleighride

Angela Morely
Snowride (3.43)

Thomas Hewitt Jones
Christmas Cracker (3.11

Soloists
Simon Callow, narrator (Night & Scrooge)

Performers
Royal Ballet Sinfonia
RTÉ Concert Orchestra
Gavin Sutherland, conductor

Label: Naxos
Year: 2011
Total Timing: 79.20

 

 

 

If I was uncertain about the quality of music in the first entry, this one is decidedly inferior. But then again, most sequels are.