Boys Chorus’ ‘Messiah’ Soars After a Slow Start

Like so many other choral organizations the world over, the Paulist Boys Choristers of California have turned Handel’s indestructible “Messiah” into their annual touchstone. Since 1995, at the prodding of director Dana Marsh, they’ve been performing the work right near the cutting edge of current notions of authenticity, allowing, of course, for the total lack of consensus as to what constitutes an “authentic Messiah.”

With Marsh on sabbatical this season, this absolutely note-complete, chamber-chorus, period-instrument “Messiah” was entrusted Friday night to the choir’s rather prominent visiting artistic director, Martin Neary, who last year completed a decade-long term as organist and master of the Choristers at Westminster Abbey. But it took a long time for the performance at Westwood’s St. Paul the Apostle Church to catch fire--and that can be hard to endure on the church’s bare wooden pews.

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The Paulist Boys sounded marvelous from beginning to end, molding the soprano parts into a sonic halo over the excellent Gentlemen of the Chapel Royal choral forces. It was Neary’s labored pacing in Part I and a good deal of Part II that held the performance back, an intimate yet sleepy treatment with surprisingly little support for the vocal soloists, where the singers and the Musica Angelica Baroque Orchestra occasionally wandered on separate paths.

But leave it to Handel to provide some ignition, and that point came during the mighty streak of energy in Part II that begins with “Why do the nations so furiously rage together?” and runs almost unimpeded through the “Hallelujah Chorus.” Now the performance took on some heft and drive, energizing everyone to the end of Part III. Let us break our bonds asunder, indeed.

Of the vocal soloists, soprano Ellen Hargis was the most consistently expressive, while mezzo-soprano Kristen Solleck-Avella could convey a genuine sense of hurt in “He was despised,” bass Curtis Streetman hit his ferocious stride in “Why do the nations,” and tenor William Hite made light, sweet work of his early arias. Everyone indulged in elaborate ornamentation, not all of which could be clearly traced over the instruments.