MUSIC REVIEW : Litton’s Baton Brings Out Best of Symphony

While conductor Andrew Litton claimed he was not in town to audition for the San Diego Symphony’s vacant music director’s post, the 28-year-old American made a stellar first impression Friday night at Symphony Hall. His genial authority on the podium elicited stylish interpretations of Mozart and Mahler, not to mention a sweet timbre from the orchestra’s strings which is heard much too rarely in this auditorium.

The showcase for Litton’s prowess on the podium was Mahler’s Fourth Symphony, which radiated a bucolic serenity throughout. Litton chose unforced, transparent textures, yet he encouraged colorful solos from unusually responsive brass and woodwind players. In spite of a leisurely pace that might have tempted some conductors to wallow in such simple pieties, Litton confidently maintained the work’s organic inner development. This incarnation of the Fourth Symphony was refined without diminishing either its heart or its exuberance.

Soprano Virginia Sublett sang the familiar fourth-movement solo with an innocent rapture completely congruent with the folk-like vision of the text. Unlike some singers who string together a senseless chain of pretty vowels, Sublett’s German diction was impeccable. She actually sounded as though she believed the poetry she was singing.

Her gracefully-arched phrases shimmered on top, although her low range did not do justice to the beginnings of Mahler’s soaring lines. A local singer who has performed with Los Angeles and New York City opera companys, Sublett’s forte is brilliant coloratura singing. It is not surprising that her mezzo range is rather undeveloped.

Prior to the intermission, principal clarinet David Peck soloed in Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto, K. 622. Ordinarily a player of great finesse and subtlety, Peck was not in his best form Friday. He began the concerto with elegant understatement, a kind of chamber music intimacy that drew the listener close with seamless, mildly plaintive lines. After a couple of breaks on high notes, however, the starch seamed to go out of Peck’s collar, and he lost his momentum.

The concerto’s middle movement was painfully slow, almost funereal, draining Mozart’s lyricism of its wonted bloom. While Peck demonstrated his technical fluency in the final rondo, he remained earthbound. Litton and the orchestra fashioned an accompaniment that could not have been more sympathetic to the soloist’s every nuance and shading. No one was on automatic pilot while the soloist held the spotlight.

The evening opened with Mozart’s Overture to “The Marriage of Figaro,” K. 492, in Litton’s hands a frothy meringue of unmitigated delight. His Mozart was smart without pretension, good-humored without donning a Tom Hulce fright wig.