MORMON CHOIR SINGS ‘MESSIAH’

Noble “Messiah” traditions abound in and around Los Angeles, but few of them are as long or as successfully tended as the annual presentation of Handel’s oratorio of 1741 by the Southern California Mormon Choir.

Indeed, the presentation, given this Christmas season for the 33rd year, still draws full houses. Friday night it seemed to fill the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion of the Music Center to the ceiling. The capacity crowd listened in rapt attention, despite the presence of a nearly normal contingent of coughers.

This devoted audience was rewarded with a very efficient, musically decent performance, led for the fifth consecutive year by Russell Fox (who succeeded Frederick Davis as leader of the choir upon Davis’ retirement).

Fox appears to stress clarity of the choral line more than voluptuousness of tone, and his 110 singers produce pleasant and balanced sounds at all times. They also deliver words understandably. What they do not do is color those words with meaning, or even hint that such meaning is critical to the religious experience being created by Handel’s masterpiece. The loss in impact is lamentable.

Nevertheless, the skeleton of this performance, in choral and instrumental execution, was admirably given. The Choir showed its ability to span a wide dynamic range--though Fox seldom insisted on utilizing the softer end of that range--and to lighten and darken its textures. The excellent, 30-member orchestra played stylishly and cohesively, except when the conductor’s accompanimental functions proved less than exactly timed.

Over these many years, the vocal soloists at the annual Southern California Mormon Choir “Messiah” performances have run the gamut from world-class to provincial. The quartet for 1986 met the higher--if not the highest--standard.

Wilhelmenia Fernandez’s solid, gleaming soprano brought musical illumination to “Rejoice, greatly,” “Come unto Him”--in which she soared easily to a high, soft B-flat--and “I know that my Redeemer liveth.” Oddly, in the arioso, “And suddenly there was with the angel,” Fernandez and conductor Fox temporarily inhabited different parts of the musical forest.

With the least colorful and least penetrating voice, Shirley Close, with her soft-grained mezzo-soprano, still proved the most expressive of the soloists, providing textual point and religious commitment in every phrase. She, practically alone, reminded us, first, that “Messiah” is a masterpiece and, second, what its subject is.

Jonathan Mack’s mellifluous sound brought aural pleasures, though few dramatic moments, to the solo tenor assignments; a lack of word-intensity suffused his otherwise musical singing. And veteran basso Giorgio Tozzi, delivering words clearly and compellingly, lacked consistency of tone and intonation to an alarming degree. His performance included both inspirational moments and times when the singing veered very far from the center of things.