Giving Voice to Favorites, Chorale Takes Easy Route

In past concerts, the Pacific Chorale has shown its ability to handle intricate textures, complex rhythms and harmonic styles that stretch the ear. But Saturday night at the Orange County Performing Arts Center, the program afforded few glimpses into the chorus’ scope of experience.

To celebrate John Alexander’s 25 years as their artistic director, the choristers had voted on their favorites from a list of a cappella works presented over the course of his tenure. Except for some gospel call-and-response, led with infectious flair by former member Carver Cossey, they selected works with slow tempos, legato phrasing, uncomplicated rhythms and primarily chordal textures.

If the choices did not challenge our sensibilities, such pieces as Durufle’s motet “Ubi Caritas” and Randall Thompson’s Alleluia did offer opportunities to hear simple, fluid singing in balanced sections and with touching effect (though also with occasional straining on top).

Even the three premieres took well-traveled paths. Resident composer James F. Hopkins set a 19th century poem by Christina Rosetti, entitled “Echo,” in “Come to Me in the Silence of the Night”--as conservative a composition as it is poignant. Alexander included a few mild dissonances in his own quietly dramatic, tonally unadventurous “Musica.”

Of the new works, only Hopkins’ “A Calendar,” to text by Sara Coleridge, gave slight test to the singers’ mettle. The performers--not the long-trained adults, but the Pacific Chorale Children’s Chorus, under the direction of Mary Ester Blakley--rose to the task with grace.

Penderecki’s difficult “Song of Cherubim” and excerpts from Rachmaninoff’s Vespers--the former included at Alexander’s insistence, not his singers’--hinted at the power and breadth of this group. Otherwise, this was a night for lovely legatos, plenty of nostalgia and finally, crowd-pleasing kitsch in Mack Wilberg’s arrangement of the folk song “Cindy,” with tacky choreography by Stephen Arel. In their defense, this last did not come from the singers’ list.