AT MUSIC CENTER PAVILION : CURRIE CONDUCTS CHORALE’S ‘MESSIAH’

Bright, airy and crisp, the Los Angeles Master Chorale’s 1987 performance of Handel’s “Messiah” breezed into the Pavilion of the Music Center, Saturday night.

John Currie, capping his first season as music director of the chorale, led this polished performance, an abridged version of sure pacing and quick tempos, considerable bounce and telling articulation.

The singing ensemble, 111 voices strong and assisted with remarkable tautness by an instrumental contingent of fewer than three dozen players, produced its customary and accomplished choral wonders, but this time with a bonus: clear and understandable words. At least one listener reveled in the chance to follow the text of “Messiah” without resort to the printed program.

Only occasionally did the massed choral production revert to that raucous, flat-toned sound noticed in Currie’s performances this season. For the most part, balances between sections, and the actual body of the sound produced, emerged pleasing.

Baroque transparency--despite the massive vocal forces employed--in a setting of strong contrasts and textual clarity would seem to have been Currie’s objective in this performance. In general, he succeeded.

The range of choral expression he achieved certainly had to earn admiration. Though the Master Chorale can no doubt sing more softly than it did at its quietest moments Saturday, the distance between its full-throated (but not strident) outbursts and its most hushed (but still clear) murmurings remains one of its greatest strengths.

In addition, the application of different vocal textures and word coloration in choruses as dissimilar as “And He shall purify” and “Surely He hath borne our griefs”--to name two of the more affecting moments--adds a dimension of interpretive achievement most “Messiah” conductors do not have at their disposal.

Similarly, the variable Sinfonia Orchestra this time around showed its best facets in playing of solid style and tight ensemble. Stuart Canin was the concertmaster. Ladd Thomas, the guest member, played harpsichord and organ continuos felicitously.

The quartet of vocal soloists supported the total reading nicely, if not always brilliantly. Andrea Matthews handled the soprano solos adeptly. Christine Cairns delivered “O thou that tellest” with pleasing lightness, but failed to bring the requisite dark side to “He was despised.”

Suppleness and sobriety marked Paul Johnson’s characterful singing of the tenor solos. Richard Cowan, vocally the strongest of these four, proved himself a promising basso and a genuine stage personality.