PROVIDENCE — Lacking leader Chip Davis, but still packing their trademark electro-pomp, Mannheim Steamroller got the holiday-concert season going last night at Veterans’ Memorial Auditorium.

The show began with a videotaped message from percussionist, composer and arranger Davis that he is recovering from neck surgery and won’t be performing with his ensemble this season. The group is also split into two touring troupes, with original band members distributed among the two ensembles.

The show was pretty much a tale of two halves: The first was full of the classic Mannheim formula, which takes a classic Christmas tune, playing the melody on a wheezing synthesizer and a highly effected violin (played by Jeff Yang) and sticking an extra measure in between each melodic phrase, while the not-very-rocking rhythm section pounds away. Their monster-hit rendition of “Joy to the World” was a perfect example last night.

It’s an acquired taste, but whether you’ve acquired it or not, the robotic pacing of the show was quickly noticeable. There was one interlude early in the show for conductor and keyboardist Chuck Penington to introduce the band, and that was it — the rest of the show was timed to the video projections (usually abstractions, imitations of Thomas Kinkade paintings or Renaissance-inspired reenactments), which left very little in the way of emotional or verbal interaction. Normally, that’s OK — it is about the music, after all — but such a dearth of contact quickly became dreary.

Thank goodness for drummer Tom Sharpe — for most of the first half of the show, his snare drum was the only instrument that wasn’t electronically processed half to death (even the rest of his kit was electronic) and he showed the only physical effort of the evening, which gave the audience at least something to latch onto visually.

Mannheim Steamroller has a new record out this year, a commissioned project that includes vocals, but the only song from it last night was the instrumental Messengers of Christmas, a martial-sounding tune with fife and drum.

The second half of the show began with a mini-set of the Renaissance tunes “Gagliarda” and “In Dulci Jubilo,” from the Fresh Aire series of Christmas records. The almost totally acoustic renditions (Yang’s fiddling was particularly impressive) and contrapuntal arrangements were a breath of — don’t make me say it.

While the electronics worked their way back into the show as it progressed, there was still more human heart in the rest of the set. There was a slab of electronic “God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen” following a nifty acoustic version, but the three-recorder introduction to “Carol of the Birds,” the toy piano on “Christmas Lullaby” and the wordless vocals and unaffected piano on the intro to the final encore, “Silent Night,” were particularly winning.

rmassimo@projo.com