Beethoven’s Ninth, in Mehta’s hands

Zubin Mehta returned to the helm of the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Walt Disney Concert Hall on Thursday to lead his former orchestra in Beethoven’s mighty Ninth Symphony. An old pro at this, Mehta conducted with a steady, knowing hand, offering few surprises or insights but also few disappointments.

He did experiment with the seating of the strings, however. Returning to earlier historical patterns, he put the first violins on his left and the seconds to his right. He also placed the cellos and basses behind the first violins and the violas behind the seconds.

The clustering of low strings greatly focused the recitative-like passages and the emergence of the “Ode to Joy” theme in the last movement.

The left-right seating of the violins also highlighted antiphonal effects intended by Beethoven -- in the opening falling motif traveling across space, for instance, or the second violins’ poignant echo of the fanfare in the adagio.

Mehta grouped the chorus, too, in an unusual way, with sopranos and altos serving as bookends for the tenors and basses. The result was a pleasingly honed sound. The ensemble, called the Los Angeles Philharmonic Community Chorus, comprised four choirs: Donald Neuen’s Angeles Chorale, William Hall’s Chapman University Singers, Kay Suh’s Hansori Chorale and Jeffrey Bernstein’s Occidental-Foothill Master Chorale. Hall prepared the singers.

At 121 voices, the group filled the chorus benches, spilling into the aisles when the singers rose to make a mighty sound. It may have been inevitable that a chorus of that size often sounded as if it was hitting every beat and also suggested that Disney Hall has limits to the fortissimos it can comfortably accommodate. But the impact was visceral.

The rough-textured solo quartet consisted of soprano Christine Brewer, mezzo-soprano Nancy Maultsby, tenor Robert Dean Smith and bass Albert Dohmen.

An essay on the Ninth published in 1838 by Hector Berlioz appeared in the program. (Like most such groups, the Phil is celebrating the Berlioz Bicentennial this season.) In it, the French composer wrote of “the sentiments of melancholy tenderness, of passionate sadness and of religious meditation” in the slow movement. One would have been hard-pressed to hear those qualities in this performance, but the symphony did come to a rousing end.

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Los Angeles Philharmonic

Where: Walt Disney Concert Hall, 111 S. Grand Ave., L.A.

When: Today, 8 p.m.; Sunday, 2 p.m.

Price: $15-$120

Contact: (323) 850-2000