By JOHN PATRICK GATTA

By JOHN PATRICK GATTA
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
The record company marketing teams must be scratching their heads, wondering why this hasn't already happened. For a group known for elegant melodies and lush production, it's surprising to find that after nearly four decades the Moody Blues have finally released a holiday-themed album.
"December" hit record store shelves last month. It offers the familiar Moody Blues sound that cuddles up to you like the heat supplied by an active fireplace on a blustery winter evening plus a few unexpected twists.
During a telephone interview from Sarasota, Fla., vocalist-guitarist Justin Hayward admitted that making an album for the holiday season never crossed the band members' minds.
What a concept
"To have any response from a record company, first of all, we needed to have an angle. For me, with the Moodys, what we've done best is a concept idea. It was a suggestion of a friend of ours, Miles Copeland. He's done some management things for us. When he first suggested it, I thought, 'No, that's not possible.' Then suddenly I thought, 'Well hang on, there's a couple of songs that I've always wanted to do.' One was a song called 'In the Bleak Midwinter,' which was a 19th-century poem by Christina Rossetti with music by Gustav Holst. I always loved that. I was going to do it one way or the other, whether it was with the Moodys or solo album."
Hayward co-arranged Bach's "Cantata No. 147," and with bassist-vocalist John Lodge added lyrics to the famous meditative composition.
"Those were the two songs we started with. I had another song that I'd written called 'December's Snow' that I'd have done on any album. Then, it all started to fall into place."
Since the album does not follow the standard rules of holiday releases by supplying kitschy, festive numbers, it works as a new Moody Blues studio album as much as it offers something to play during the final month of the calendar year.
Besides five original numbers, "December" includes five cover tunes, including a take on "White Christmas" that's suited to the band's style as well as the John Lennon-Yoko Ono classic "Happy Xmas [War is Over]."
Moody Blues sound
Commenting on how the album stays true to the Moody Blues sound, Hayward also describes the group's musical approach" "I think our responsibility is to trust our own judgment. That's our responsibility to the people who are interested in the music. Know that it's from the heart and sincere. It's exactly what we want to do.
"I'm open to every idea but, at the same time, we're kind of stuck with a style whether we like it or not. We just sound like that band. The stuff we do that works best is that kind of melancholy stuff even if it has a rock 'n' roll beat or if it's got a hard edge it's still got some kind of touching melody."
Like numerous British acts of the mid-'60s, the Moody Blues were influenced by American soul music but transformed that into something within the pop realm. Despite its second single, "Go Now," being a major success on both sides of the Atlantic, the group couldn't produce a worthy follow-up. Friction within its ranks led to personnel changes, and in came Lodge, followed by Hayward.
The combination of Hayward's gentle approach coupled with Lodge's rock leanings would serve the Moody Blues quite well over the next 36 years and the band's more than two dozen studio, live and compilation releases.
Drummer Graeme Edge remains the lone original member.
'Days of Future Passed'
Shortly after Hayward and Lodge joined, the band's record company wanted to showcase its new stereo sound and picked the Moody Blues as the band to collaborate with the London Festival Orchestra.
Label executives wanted a recording of Dvorak's "New World Symphony," but the group incorporated classical with rock to create the landmark "Days of Future Passed." The album included "Nights in White Satin" and "Tuesday Afternoon." Hayward's warm timbre and Lodge's deep tone suited the lush quality of the material.
The group has sold millions of albums worldwide, but the members' low-key personalities have never given the Moody Blues the major press coverage some of its peers from the 1960s receive. Hayward doesn't mind the anonymity, although he is famous enough that he must use a pseudonym when checking into his hotel room.
"Even at our height, which I suppose was 1972-73, 'Days of Future Passed,' our first album, had finally got to No. 1 five years after it was released. Even then we were people's fifth, sixth favorite band or something on these polls. In 1973, we actually won a lot of awards for being the biggest-selling band in the world, curiously enough. But still, we didn't spring to mind as people's favorite band. It's just that just about everybody had our records at that time."
Resurgence
Following a hiatus where the members focused on solo projects, the band had a commercial resurgence that began in 1978, rose to a higher level in the mid-1980s and has lasted despite critical indifference. A devoted group of followers allows the Moody Blues to tour consistently each year, performing in a stripped-down band format or with orchestras.
"We were very lucky again to go round again in the '80s. That was the spark that set the fire that brings us here today is we had a couple of big hit singles. Certainly out of the blue. One being called 'Your Wildest Dreams' the other being, 'I Know You're Out There Somewhere.' They're probably the biggest copyrights that I have as a writer. As a group, they're the reason probably that we're still here and not a nostalgia band from the '60s."