Standout Stand-Ins : Two able guest conductors lead the Ventura County Symphony in performing works by Haydn and Mozart.

Boris Brott continued his high-profile inaugural season with the Ventura County Symphony last Saturday at the Oxnard Civic Auditorium, but the amicable maestro wasn’t wielding a baton this time around.

Brott came center stage to conduct the house in singing the national anthem (what is this, a baseball game?), and then joked at the microphone, “This will go on record as the shortest concert I’ve ever conducted.”

Because of scheduling conflicts, Brott wasn’t able to lead the Symphony’s first concert of 1993, and used the opening as an opportunity to lend the podium to two able, Ventura-based guest conductors. He showed up Saturday on “busman’s holiday” to warm up the crowd and hear the orchestra from an audience member’s perspective.

The Symphony’s assistant conductor, Gregory Fried, made his official Oxnard Civic debut conducting Haydn’s Symphony No. 96 in D Major, “The Miracle.” Burns Taft, director of both the Master Chorale and the newly launched Ventura County Chamber Orchestra, led a huge, expanded ensemble in Mozart’s rueful but ultimately heroic “Requiem.”

In introducing Taft, Brott praised his leadership of the Master Chorale over the past decade, but neglected to mention--an oversight?--Taft’s latest major venture. The Ventura County Chamber Orchestra, which had its debut last month, surfaced amid fears within the Symphony organization of undue competition.

Politics aside, Saturday’s concert was a finely rendered and absorbing celebration of the classical period, based on two major works dating from 1791. Of course, Haydn’s brightly hued, affirmative Symphony No. 96 is a very different beast from Mozart’s “Requiem,” left unfinished at the time of his death.

True to the Haydn-era model, Fried separated the first and second string section, to either side of the podium. The result was intriguing and refreshing--a richer spatial spread. If not always watertight in their execution, the strings proved capable of achieving the required classical balance of luster and energy.

Brisk, light bowing on the final vivace movement propelled the piece to its neat conclusion. Everything was in its place, all was right with the world.

The concert’s second half belonged to the “Requiem,” with Taft marshaling the orchestral and choral forces that made for a full stage and a full sound.

Solo parts were crisply handled by soprano Viriena Lind, in an extravagant crimson gown; alto Lesley Leighton; tenor Agostino Castagnola, and bass Dennis Rupp.

The “Requiem” is a mournful but not morose piece, a quality neatly captured under Taft’s guidance. The ensemble aptly portrayed the hint of redemption and resignation in “Recordare,” the deep blue of “Lacrymosa,” and the fleeting uplift of “Sanctus.”

The finale amounts to a rousing climax, while still in a mode of impassioned reverence.

Is the “Requiem” a prayer in musical terms for those gone and those going, or is it a poignant reminder of the way of all flesh? When the piece is performed as persuasively as it was in Oxnard, the answer is both, and more.

Sunday Afternoon in Thousand Oaks

For the past eight years now, the Sunday Afternoon Musicale in Thousand Oaks has presented a dizzying variety of musicians. Financial support by patrons at the private and civic level allows for a ticket price of $2, “the best bargain in town,” as director Katherine Smith put it.

Last Sunday, the 1993 series--which runs on the first Sunday of every month--began on a potentially rocky note. The originally planned concert, with pianists Jan Holmquist and Rob Woyshner playing together on a single piano, was postponed when Holmquist was hospitalized with the flu.

Woyshner filled in with a generally pleasing recital, joined by the fine soprano Sally Curry. At its best, the concert basked in the splendors of Handel, Debussy, and Copland’s settings of old American folk songs, notable for Curry’s strong vocalizing.

The gifted Woyshner extracted a chilling beauty from a Chopin nocturne, complemented by the spacious atmosphere of the Ascension Lutheran Church in Thousand Oaks. But he also slipped into some New Age-ish noodling on the theme of various hymns, which tended to undermine the otherwise luminous repertoire.

Still, it was a fine way to spend a rainy Sunday afternoon in Thousand Oaks.

The County’s Other Symphony

There is symphonic life on the other side of the Conejo Grade. While overshadowed by the advancing enterprise of the Ventura County Symphony, the Conejo Symphony, under Elmer Ramsey’s direction, carries on undaunted.

There is crossover between the two ensembles. One of the more notable soloists last year with the Conejo Symphony was the New York Philharmonic’s violinist Glenn Dictorow, who will appear with the Ventura Symphony’s next concert, on March 6.

The guest soloist for the Conejo Symphony’s concert this Saturday at Cal Lutheran University will be cellist Stephen Custer, who lives in Westlake Village. A member of the Los Angeles Philharmonic since 1973, Custer also involves himself in local music events, and last performed with the Conejo Symphony in 1990.

For Saturday’s program, Custer will be the protagonist in Dvorak’s Cello Concerto in B Minor, Op. 104.

* WHERE AND WHEN

The Conejo Symphony will perform Saturday at 8 p.m. at Cal Lutheran University Auditorium, Memorial Parkway in Thousand Oaks. For more information call 498-7092.