MASTER CHORALE OPENS 22ND SEASON

If the Los Angeles Master Chorale had to have a title for the opening concert of its 22nd season in the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion on Saturday night, “St. Mark’s to Mozart” served as well as any. But the evening conducted by Roger Wagner was wholly taken over by Mozart--for what except Bach’s B minor Mass or Beethoven’s “Missa Solemnis” could possibly compete with Mozart’s gigantic Mass in C minor, K. 427?

The work has a troubled history. Mozart did not complete it in time for the Salzburg premiere in 1783 (he was 27 then); he simply filled in the vacant spaces with earlier compositions.

Nor did he bother to complete the work after it had once been performed, for reasons still unknown. All kinds of editing and patchwork had to be resorted to in later performances; the edition used on this occasion was produced by H. C. Robins Landon in 1956 and wisely leaves the work as nearly as possible as Mozart left it.

In the grandiose performance of the Master Chorale, conducted by Wagner with unrelenting intensity and concentration, there was no sense of incompleteness. The Sanctus and Benedictus rounded off the score with unarguable finality.

The chorus sang with compelling power, explicit shadings and unshakable security of execution. The enlarged Pacific Symphony of Orange County rose to the occasion with confidence if not always with maximum subtlety.

The all-important soprano solo, written by Mozart for his bride, Constanze (she must have been quite a singer, or Mozart was flattering her), fell to the pure and limpid voice of Alison Hargan, squarely on pitch, charming in sound, impeccable in the formidable roulades, lacking only a true trill. The mezzo, Kimball Wheeler, was likewise undaunted by the hazards, and sang freely and openly. The two male soloists, John Duykers, tenor, and Norman Goss, bass, had no solos, but acquitted themselves adequately in the several ensembles.

To open the evening, Wagner presented himself as the composer of a short “Jubilate Deo omnis terra,” for four widely dispersed choruses, based on a Gregorian chant. The subsequent choral works by the two Gabrielis and Jacob Handl were, as usual with Wagner, finally attuned to the archaic spirit.

A modest excursion into the contemporary brought Morten Lauridsen’s “Mid-Winter Songs,” settings of six poems by Robert Graves, most appealing when quiet and meditative, otherwise inclined to be a jagged and spiky style of writing.