MUSIC AND DANCE REVIEWS : VAUGHAN WILLIAMS

“Nationalistic but not isolationist” is one of the more succinct descriptions that has been given to the music of Ralph Vaughan Williams. That precis came to mind more than once in the Vaughan Williams program by the William Hall Chorale, sung without orchestra, Saturday night in Pasadena Presbyterian Church.

The English composer’s breadth and universality was displayed, again, in an agenda encompassing “Flos Campi,” for solo viola, a wordless chorus, and orchestra; “Five Mystical Songs” (1911), and “Five Tudor Portraits” (1935). With Peter Fennema playing his own arrangements of the orchestra parts on the 98-rank Aeolian-Skinner organ, the colorful instrumentations were at least indicated.

More important, the choral parts emerged pristine, powerfully sung but utterly without stridency; at 85 voices in this program, the Hall Chorale produced mellow, pliable, sensitive and gorgeous vocalism. Hall’s unobtrusive but authoritative conducting held all in balance.

Debbie Cree was the engaging and versatile mezzo-soprano soloist in two of the “Tudor” songs, ranging easily between deep low notes and round climaxes. Robin Buck’s resonant baritone delivered words as tellingly as handsome sound. The confident, highly promising viola soloist in “Flos Campi” was John Acevedo.