The Canadian Brass likes to have fun.
"We want the audience to feel comfortable," said Jens Lindemann, who plays trumpet in the Toronto-based brass quintet. "There can almost be a barrier between performers and audiences -- we want to break down that barrier. If they want to laugh we want them to laugh."But don't get the idea that the group has fun at the expense of the music. "The music itself we play as seriously as any chamber group up there," Lindemann said during a telephone interview from his Toronto home. "That's a very important credo the group has had since the beginning."
Thus, you get the group coming out in tuxedos -- and sneakers.
"This group was doing crossover before crossover became fashionable," Lindemann said.
On Wednesday, the group will cross over the border into Utah for a special event concert in Abravanel Hall. The concert begins at 8 p.m.
The group's impressive interpretations of Mozart and Handel and Barber and Bizet -- the whole palette of composers from Baroque to modern -- appeal to the musical congoscenti, while a sense of humor makes the concerts ideal date nights for youth.
In other words, if you think classical music has to be dry and snobbish and humorless to be good, don't bother coming.
"One shouldn't walk in saying music should be like this or music should be like that," Lindemann said.
The Canadian Brass began 29 years ago when a bunch of brass players in Toronto's Hamilton Philharmonic decided to form a group of their own. "It was an opportunity for them to get out of the back of the orchestra and get out in front."
Even after all that time, two members of the original group are still with it: tuba player Charles Daellenbach and trombonist Eugene Watts. Besides Lindemann, Watts and Daellenbach, the group includes horn player Christopher Cooper and trumpet player Ronald Romm.
"It was a dream for me to join this group," the 32-year-old Lindemann said. "They all signed my trumpet years ago, when I was 12 years old. Every brass player of my generation was influenced by the Canadian Brass."
From what began as a bit of a whim, the group's unique mixture of musicianship and irreverence quickly made the Canadian Brass the most popular brass quintet in the world. The group tours seven months of the year, performing 120 concerts. Its more than 50 albums sell briskly.
The group has also transcribed, or commissioned transcriptions of, vast numbers of musical pieces for brass quintet. This was necessary because of the lack of a whole lot of music written specifically for that type of ensemble.
"The Baroque era was really a golden age for brass -- Baroque music does tend to work well for brass," Lindemann said. "But there were 150 years -- the classical and romantic periods -- where very, very little was done for brass players.
"Brass players don't have the depth of repertoire, and that turned out to be an advantage for us in many ways because everything was created. The most important thing was to play music that we loved playing, period."
Thus are explained the Canadian Brass' recent CDs of music by the Beatles and Duke Ellington. "It's very dangerous to give any music a label. Our genre of music is not clearly defined, and I think that's very important."
As for what to expect at Wednesday's concert, consider this: "I can assure you that it will be fun. They will have fun, we guarantee it."
Tickets range from $19 to $46, and can be purchased at the Capitol Theatre or Abravanel Hall box offices, or by calling 355-ARTS.