MUSIC REVIEW : Choir Performs Moving Tribute

Richard Raub, music director and conductor of the Orange Coast Singers, prefaced his community choir’s opening work Saturday night by dedicating it to Leonard Bernstein as composer, conductor and, especially, educator. By the conclusion of Mozart’s “Ave Verum Corpus,” it was easy to imagine that Bernstein the teacher would have been pleased with the association.

Leading the performance at Robert Moore Theatre on the campus of Orange Coast College, Raub drew an inward-looking and moving tribute from his group. The choir offered a balanced and subdued reading marked by well-focused tone and clear enunciation.

Raub brought in some heavyweight vocal soloists for the evening, names before which a lesser group would have paled: soprano Catherine McCord Larsen, mezzo Debbie Cree, tenor Jonathan Mack and baritone LeRoy Villanueva. As ever, the strengths of this choir lie in its transparent clarity, which Raub encourages by intermingling voice types rather than grouping them into sections.

In offsetting arias in Handel’s “Chandos” Anthem No. 9 and two works of J.S. Bach--”Wie freudig ist mein Herz” and Missa Brevis in G Minor, BWV 235--the ensemble maintained clear interplay of even the most florid lines, ever attentive to shaping and directing phrases.

The soloists had some problems, especially in the alto aria of the “Chandos” anthem, which hovered lower than Cree’s ideal range, and in the soprano aria of the same piece, in which it was impossible to understand the text. Nevertheless, given a more suitable vehicle in “Domine Fili Unigenite,” from the Bach mass, Cree redeemed herself with a compelling, round-toned invocation. And while Larsen’s light, nimble soprano fell occasional victim to orchestral accompaniment, it eased naturally into Baroque ornamental style.

Mack imparted infectious joy for “glad hymns of praise” during the anthem, and in that selection as well as in Bach’s supplicating “Qui tollis peccata mundi,” he flourished facile control of filigree with an open tone that extended into the highest passages. In the latter aria, oboist Larry Timm gave stirring voice to the obbligato.

A powerful and unforced baritone characterized Villanueva’s solos from Handel’s anthem and Bach’s mass. In both cases, he paid serious attention to textual interpretation and musical shaping, even when, for instance, Handel’s relentless dotted rhythm might have resulted in a mechanical delivery.

Haydn’s first horn concerto, with Richard Todd as protagonist, followed the “Chandos” anthem to end the first half of the program. Todd, who occupies the principal chair with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, cut a Lisztean figure, with long, sandy hair and chiseled features, standing to play without music. And the performance--an elegant display of virtuosic control throughout a tremendous range--did not tarnish the image.