Australian Brandenburgs spread some musical Christmas cheer

Just as sure as Santa’s in his grotto Paul Dyer and his merry Australian Brandenburgs have been bringing some Christmas cheer.

Steve Moffatt

2 min read

December 15, 2024 - 9:56AM

Wentworth Courier

The Australian Brandenburgs’ Noel! Noel! concert in City Recital Hall. Picture: Keith Saunders

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JUST as sure as Santa’s in his grotto and the halls are decked with holly, Paul Dyer and his merry band of Australian Brandenburg singers and players have been bringing some Christmas cheer to concert halls and churches.

Dyer is famous for cooking up a spicy festive musical feast for his Australian Brandenburg Orchestra and Choir Noel! Noel! concerts, and this year followed the tried and true recipe of mixing the old and new over five sets in a straight-through 90-minute program.

The opening bracket – a mixture of Claudio Monteverdi and an instrumental arrangement of Once In Royal David’s City featuring recorder and theorbo – set the scene for what was to come. After the splendid trumpets and drums of the Prologo from Monteverdi’s opera L’Orfeo, Brandenburg Choir soprano Astrid Girdis featured in an aria from his 1610 musical vespers setting Vespro della Beata Vergine.

Girdis showed great presence as well as a pure tone and the choir were in top form for this, their opening number.

A Vivaldi set included a concerto featuring ABO flautist Mikaela Oberg on recorder, duelling with Heidi Jones on chamber organ, with Dyer taking over the keyboard part for the solo adagio.

Soprano Astrid Girdis performing in the Noel! Noel! concert. Picture: Keith Saunders

Girdis starred again in part of the Salve Regina and the choir were in full flight for excerpts from the Red Priest’s great sacred masterpiece Gloria.

A trio of sackbuts, the forerunner of modern trombones, always feature in these concerts, often alongside a pair of “natural” valveless trumpets, and percussionist Brian Nixon provides a wide array of finely nuanced effects for some of the instrumental works which this year included fine sonatas by two 17th century composers, Daniel Speer and Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber.

The choir come to the front of the stage for the beautiful and moving a cappella piece Good Night, Dear Heart by American composer Dan Forrest, who wrote it in response to the death of a little Ethiopian girl who was about to be adopted by his brother.

Similarly moving, and gorgeously sung, was the compulsory Silent Night. The Brandies’ regular composer and arranger Alex Palmer’s The Twelve Carols of Christmas – an instrumental work which cleverly and neatly incorporates phrases from a whole host of carols ancient and modern – never fails to entertain.

There was less funny business this year than in previous Noel shows, but there some nice festive touches with lighting designers Trent Suidgeest and Ryan McDonald providing a spectacular display of stars suspended above the stage and Robert Nairn had a Santa’s hat placed at a jaunty angle on the scroll of his bass violone.

You can catch the last in the series at St Patrick’s Cathedral, Parramatta, on Tuesday, December 17, at 7.30pm.