MUSIC REVIEWS : Long Beach Symphony’s Mahler Finale

It isn’t difficult to make a big noise with Mahler’s Second Symphony, the mammoth “Resurrection.” The composer, reportedly the most accomplished and canny conductor of his time, took care of that himself.

The interpretive gift is in making telling points with the far more time-consuming, delicately detailed episodes between the big bangs.

All you need to make the noise effective is a disciplined, well-balanced orchestra. This the Long Beach Symphony proved to be on Saturday in delivering the more obvious goods for the Terrace Theater audience with glowing--never raucous--brassy heft in the climaxes of the outer movements.

More impressive, however, was the flow and pointing given to the felicities of scoring and melodic invention with which Mahler packed the landler second section and the mocking Scherzo. These were shaped with utmost refinement by JoAnn Falletta, her orchestra’s suave strings and secure solo winds.

The tricky, hushed entrance of the huge chorus in the finale, faultlessly executed by John Alexander’s Pacific Chorale--which also handled with grace, not merely volume, the thunderous concluding paean--and the sweetness of the trumpets in the “Urlicht” movement were other cherishable details.

The production’s single weakness was mezzo-soprano Yun Deng’s rather timid and fluttery singing of the sublime “Urlicht” song, whose great space requires filling out by a major voice.

However, the other soloist, soprano Louise Russell, proved, with Yeng, convincing in the ecstatic life-affirmation of the finale.

Still, the evening belonged to the superbly accomplished players of the Long Beach Symphony under Falletta’s wise and vital guidance.