Music : Baritone Kimbrough in Return Recital at Occidental

An exact contemporary of conductors Zubin Mehta and David Zinman, Steven Kimbrough is a veteran singer of wide repertory, good taste and solid interpretive skills, which he has displayed on international stages for decades. In his return to Thorne Hall at Occidental College, however, the American baritone did not live up to his own reputation.

When last he visited the Eagle Rock campus, three years ago, Kimbrough, with pianist Dalton Baldwin, presented an intriguing connoisseur’s program of songs by Kurt Weill and Erich Wolfgang Korngold.

Saturday night, again with Baldwin at the Steinway, the 56-year-old singer brought an evening of music by Franz Schubert and Richard Strauss. One could appreciate the interpretive vision and breadth of expression in these 22, carefully arranged lieder, but one has to lament Kimbrough’s inability to make all of the pieces work.

In generally proficient performances, the baritone chose only a few songs that exposed his present weaknesses of technique, tone-production and range. But those few did so cruelly.

At the start of the evening, what seemed to be the remnants of a cold, or a simple failure to warm up, plagued the singer: Pitch seemed insecure, focus missing, words cloudy. When the voice began to emerge more clearly, not all of the problems disappeared.

In the Schubertian first half, the strongest performances came in songs in which text-interpretation is more crucial than voice: the 11th through 13th items in the 14-song “Schwanengesang” cycle. These Kimbrough and Baldwin limned authoritatively, joining thoughts to words to sounds most effectively, and coloring those sounds in wonderful detail.

There were also nice moments in the Strauss groups, particularly in a handsomely delivered, quietly pensive “Traum durch die Dammerung.” But the moments were nearly forgotten in those numerous passages where lack of vocal power, uncontrolled pitch and haphazard tone-quality came together.

Pianist Baldwin, at 61, another respected veteran, did not save the evening, as he might have.

Instead, he created a paradox, often playing too loudly while supporting too little. And, taking bows generously offered by the baritone, Baldwin showed with his body language--turning away from the audience, looking offstage and rubbing his hands together--that he probably didn’t want to be where he was.