Southwest Chamber Gives ‘60s Spirit a ‘90s Spin

In musing upon the final pair of Southwest Chamber Music programs celebrating the now-defunct Pasadena Art Museum’s “Encounters” series (1964-73), it was startling to realize that figures such as Milton Babbitt and John Cage are now regarded as old masters. And now that the Cage/Babbitt chance-versus-serialism debates are deep in the past, Saturday’s program at the Armory Center for the Arts seemed to cast them into different roles--Babbitt as musical dramatist, Cage as transcendental jester.

Babbitt’s “Vision and Prayer” tumbled forth in a stream of haunting, almost sweetly twinkling electronic lights, while “Philomel” dazzled with its meticulous shadings and contrasts. Soprano Phyllis Bryn-Julson luminously reacted to each text as the electronic scores were piped through loudspeakers with greater life than LPs of old.

Cage’s “Atlas Eclipticalis” can be performed by any or all of 20 instruments, for a few minutes or three hours. Here, conductor Stephen “Lucky” Mosko opted for a 50-minute time span with 14 players while Bryn-Julson, baritone Michael Ingham and pianist Gayle Blankenburg superimposed performances of Cage’s “Songbooks” and “Winter Music.” One could enjoy the humor of episodes like Bryn-Julson’s roll call of “Encounters” composers, yet those with rapid metabolisms may find the static, percussive tread of “Atlas” wearying. Bryn-Julson also made fine theatrical work of Cage’s “Aria,” an encyclopedia of extended vocal effects.

The featured performer of the first half of Sunday’s program was a CD changer, which played the Wergo transfer of Morton Subotnick’s “Silver Apples of the Moon”--still a careening thrill ride more than 30 years after it burst on the scene, though its mad electronic waltz sounded congested in this acoustic space. Bryn-Julson offered more virtuoso exercises in vocal dada a la Luciano Berio’s “Sequenza III” and Cathy Berberian’s “Stripsody.” And there was a valuable reminder of the most pervasive ‘60s musical spirit of all, the Beatles, with straightforward Toru Takemitsu guitar transcriptions of “Hey Jude,” “Michelle” and “Yesterday” played a bit haltingly yet reverently by Stuart Fox. I wouldn’t bet against these great tunes outlasting everything else from these programs.

*

* Sunday’s and Saturday’s programs repeat at 5:30 and 8 p.m., respectively, today at the Zipper Concert Hall, 200 S. Grand Ave. (800) 726-7147. $10-$20.